Male peer support and sexual assault: the relation between high-profile, high school sports participation and sexually predatory behaviour

ABSTRACT

The etiology of the nexus between high-profile athletic participation and sexual aggression has been explained using Male Peer Support (MPS) Theory, though research is dated and has relied heavily upon college athletic participation. The present study assesses the relation between retrospective participation in high-profile, high school (HS) team sports and woman abuse using survey responses from a sample of 280 undergraduate men at a public university in the Pacific Northwest. Results from multivariate regression models indicate retrospective participation in high-profile, HS team sports was not a significant predictor of sexual aggression once other theoretical factors were accounted for in analyses. Endorsement of rape myths, increased encouragement from all-male peers for maladaptive behaviour, pornography consumption frequency, fraternity membership, and problematic alcohol consumption patterns predicted predatory sexual behaviour. Prevention programmes should target at-risk populations and all-male peer groups, specifically focusing on behaviours supportive of woman abuse.

KEYWORDS:

• Athletes
• attitudes towards women
• male peer support
• sexual aggression

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

1 These include police personnel, country club members, male dormitory residents, fraternity members, and athletes.

2 The Cronbach’s alpha reported here is low for the Likelihood to Rape scale, however, similar values have been reported in recent research (see Bouffard & Goodson, 2017) on sexual coercion and the hypothetical likelihood of engaging in sexually aggressive behaviours.

3 Supplemental ANOVA analyses were conducted to determine if there were group differences between participants who were classified as “non-athletes,” “non-high-profile athletes,” and “high-profile athletes” on maladaptive attitudes, male-peer support, alcohol and pornography consumption, and sexually aggressive behaviours. Participants who were “non-athletes” and “non-high-profile athletes” were combined due to lack of meaningful differences in the ANOVA analyses.

4 Race and participation in college high-profile team sports were not included in in the analyses because of the small amount of variation within each category.

5 SPSS, version 22.0 was used to analyze the data. For each multi-item independent variable, scale scores were developed using exploratory factor analysis (EFA) with maximum likelihood estimation (MLE). Prior to estimating the statistical models, the data were screened for skewness and kurtosis. Estimates fell within the acceptable range and did not exceed recommended cut off values of 3.0 and 8.0, respectively (Kline, 2005). Multicollinearity diagnostics were also evaluated; tolerances ranged from .723 to .993 and variance inflation factors (VIF) ranged from 1.007 to 1.477 indicating that multicollinearity was not a problem (Belsley, Kuh, & Welsch, 1980). The values of the Durbin-Watson were 2.21.

6 Participant age was included as a covariate of sexual aggression in supplemental analyses to account for the elapsed time between HS and survey completion. Additionally, participant age was included as a moderating variable with high-profile HS sports participation, pornography and alcohol consumption, male-peer support, and sexual aggression. There were no substantive changes in the results and the interactions were not significant. These analyses are not included in tabular form, but are available upon request.