Teresa A. Treat - US grants

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Male-initiated sexual aggression toward female acquaintances is a major public-health problem in adolescence and early adulthood, and risk of sexual aggression is strongly associated with alcohol use. The efficacy of existing prevention programs for sexual aggression has been disappointing, suggesting that additional pathways to change should be investigated. Because alcohol intoxication is such an important contextual variable for sexual aggression, it is also important to evaluate the generalizability of any changes to the intoxicated state. The current project seeks to translate emerging methods from cognitive and learning sciences into a novel cognitive-training procedure and to evaluate the degree to which training effects are maintained during intoxication in the laboratory. Ultimately, we hope that extended versions of the proposed training procedure could be used to supplement existing prevention efforts in sexual aggression. The goals are (1) To evaluate whether a novel cognitive-training procedure enhances men's learning about women's social cues and whether those training effects transfer to other tasks assessing attention, decision-making, and behavioral intention to exhibit sexual aggression; (2) To examine alcohol effects on men's processing of women's affective cues, their decision making, and their behavioral intention to exhibit sexual aggression; and (3) To determine whether the training program moderates or reduces alcohol effects on attention, decision making and behavioral intention to exhibit sexual aggression. One-hundred eighty 21- 25 year old participants will complete either the training program or a control task, after which they will be randomly assigned to consume either no alcohol or a moderate dose of alcohol. Both groups will complete social-cognitive tasks assessing attention, decision making, and behavioral intention. In another session, participants will complete assessments of drinking patterns, alcohol expectancies, rape supportive attitudes, and past history of sexual aggression. Multilevel and general linear modeling will be used to evaluate the influence of training condition and intoxication on cognitive processing as well as the interactions of training and alcohol effects. The explicit translational goal of the project isto take emerging theory and methods from basic cognitive and learning science and develop them into procedures with the potential of contributing to effective prevention efforts in sexual aggression, and which will be robust to the important contextual effects of alcohol intoxication.

? DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Male-initiated sexual aggression toward female acquaintances is a major public-health problem in adolescence and early adulthood. The efficacy of existing prevention programs has been disappointing, necessitating the conduct of innovative basic science research that will lay the foundation for the development of novel prevention strategies. Risk of sexual aggression between acquaintances is associated both theoretically and empirically with alcohol use and with misperception of women's sexual-interest cues. Research also demonstrates that alcohol consumption decreases men's sensitivity to women's sexual interest, but the mechanisms underlying this effect are unknown. The current project draws upon methods from cognitive and vision science to evaluate the role of overt visual attention (i.e., moment-by-moment eye movements) in men's perception of women's sexual-interest cues, and to examine the influence of alcohol consumption on men's attention and decision-making when judging sexual interest. The goals are to determine (1) whether men's visual attention to women's faces, women's bodies, and the background context account for men's use of dating-relevant cues when judging women's sexual interest; (2) whether moderate alcohol consumption influences visual attention and use of dating-relevant cues; and (3) whether visual attention accounts for the association between alcohol consumption and use of dating-relevant cues. Eighty 21-25 year old participants will complete alcohol and no-alcohol sessions in a counterbalanced order. While their eye movements are monitored, participants will view 200 unique scenes that depict a woman who varies along sexual interest, provocativeness-of-dress, and attractiveness dimensions in a background context that varies in sexual relevance. Participants will judge the woman's sexual interest after viewing each scene. In a third session, participants will complete assessments of drinking patterns, alcohol expectancies, rape supportive attitudes, insensitivity to women's rejection cues in a simulated rape, and past history of sexual aggression. Multilevel modeling will be used to evaluate the hypothesized links between alcohol condition, visual attention, and men's use of dating-relevant cues. The explicit translational goal of the project is to leverage theories and methods from basic cognitive and vision science to advance understanding of the effect of alcohol consumption on men's perceptions of women. The present project will lay the groundwork for the future development of cognitive-training strategies that target the precise visual-attention patterns generating individul differences in sexual- interest judgments and consumption-related reductions in men's sensitivity.

Abstract Despite increased attention to heavy episodic drinking (HED) and sexually aggressive behavior (SAB), high rates persist, and existing prevention programs are minimally effective. Programs that simultaneously target HED and SAB may be more effective as most sexual assaults occur when the perpetrator, victim, or both have been drinking. Such programs have shown some promise in college women but only one small open trial (n = 20) has been conducted with college men. Risky sexual behaviors (RSB) are also highly comorbid with HED and SAB. Although prevention programs targeting HED and RSB have demonstrated reductions in both behaviors, the proposed study will be the first to test the efficacy of an integrative prevention program that simultaneously targets SAB, HED, and RSB. The proposed study also breaks new ground by incorporating skills training derived from cutting-edge cognitive science methods. Our prior research shows that men at higher risk for SAB demonstrate performance-based deficits in perceptions of women?s sexual interest, and our preliminary data provide evidence for the efficacy of cognitive training, in which men receive trial-by-trial and block-by-block feedback on their ability to process cues relevant to women?s sexual interest. Incorporation of a cognitive training component may increase the efficacy of prevention approaches for SAB, which have typically focused on awareness or education rather than skill development. Personalized feedback approaches represent one of the most effective prevention approaches for HED and similar approaches have shown promise in addressing risk for SAB. By combining personalized feedback and cognitive skills training approaches, it is possible to target the key modifiable risk factors for SAB, including misperceptions of sexual interest, rape supportive attitudes, peer influence, HED, and RSB. To our knowledge, the proposed study will be the first to integrate personalized feedback and cognitive skills-training approaches to reduce men?s risk of perpetrating SAB. The proposed study will include three phases and involve a total of 190 sexually active and heavy drinking college men. Phase I will examine feasibility (n = 10), and Phase II will be an open trial (n = 40) examining the acceptability and efficacy of intervention components. Outcome and qualitative data from interviews in Phase II will be used to refine and streamline the intervention. Phase III will be a small (n = 140) randomized controlled trial (RCT) comparing this novel computer-administered program to services as usual (SAU). The prevention program will include two computer-administered sessions (60-90 minutes each) integrating personalized feedback and cognitive-training approaches. We hypothesize that, relative to SAU, the prevention program will lead to changes in personalized feedback and cognitive training targets (e.g., readiness to change and cognitive skills) and less engagement in and attitudes supportive of HED, SAB, and RSB. Findings of this preliminary study will support a larger clinical trial of a fully web-based program, an approach that could easily be implemented on a broad scale and is likely to be well received by young adults.