Race/ethnicity, negative peer support, and polyvictimization among college women

Abstract

Advances in social scientific understandings of female racial/ethnic minority college students’ experiences of woman abuse have not kept pace with the amount of theoretical and empirical work on the plight of their White counterparts. What is especially needed is a study that examines racial/ethnic variations in negative peer support for various types of victimization in institutions of higher learning. Using the Campus Quality of Life Survey, results show (1) no significant differences between White and racial/ethnic minority women students in polyvictimization within types of abuse (i.e., stalking, harassment, sexual assault, and intimate partner violence), but some differences in overall rates of victimization and polyvictimization, and (2) negative peer support is strongly related to woman abuse and polyvictimization. Implications are discussed.

Keywords:

• Campus victimization
• harassment
• intimate partner violence
• negative peer support
• sexual assault
• stalking
• violence against women

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank William F. Flack for his assistance.

Disclosure statement

The authors have no relevant financial or non-financial interests to declare.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Walter S. DeKeseredy

Walter S. DeKeseredy is Anna Deane Carlson Endowed Chair of Social Sciences, Director of the Research Center on Violence, and Professor of Sociology at West Virginia University. DeKeseredy has published numerous scholarly materials on various social problems, and in 2022, he was named a Fellow of the American Society of Criminology.

Alison J. Marganski

Alison J. Marganski is a Director and Professor of Criminology at Le Moyne College. Marganski’s work utilizes interdisciplinary and intersectional perspectives to examine and respond to violence (victimization as well as perpetration), including cyber/technology-facilitated violence, intimate partner violence, sexual violence, stalking, mass murder, and other non-lethal and lethal crimes.

Adam J. Pritchard

Adam J. Pritchard is a sociologist whose research has focused on victimization over the life course, including sexual victimization among college students, adult domestic violence, and homicide. His work with military veterans focuses on transition challenges, employment, education, rural places, and entrepreneurship.

James Nolan

James Nolan is Professor of Sociology at West Virginia University where he teaches courses relating to institutional reform, structured inequality, and social control. His research focuses on police reform, hate crime, crime measurement, and institutional reform in higher education.