Background

Although research has established an association between alcohol use and sexual assault, few studies have examined how characteristics of the perpetrator may influence sexual aggression depending upon whether alcohol is consumed by the perpetrator and/or the victim. As such, this laboratory-based investigation was designed to disentangle the effects of individual differences in masculine gender role stress and sexual aggression perpetration as a function of (1) men’s acute alcohol intoxication and (2) whether a woman was consuming alcohol or not.

Method

A community sample of 156 men presented to two laboratory sessions, during which they completed a self-report measure of masculine gender role stress (Session 1) and completed a modified version of the sexual imposition paradigm after consuming an alcoholic or non-alcohol beverage (Session 2). In this paradigm, participants and a male friend were told that an ostensible female participant had consumed or not consumed alcohol. They were also told that she did not wish to view sexual content. Participants were then provided the opportunity to make the female confederate view a sexually or non-sexually explicit film. Sexual aggression was operationalized by selection of the sexually explicit film.

Results

A hierarchical logistic regression showed that men higher in masculine gender role stress who were (1) intoxicated were more likely than sober men to select the sexually explicit film when the woman was intoxicated, and (2) intoxicated, men were less likely than sober men to select the sexually explicit film when the woman was sober.

Conclusions

Findings suggest that sexual aggression perpetration is most likely among higher masculine gender role stress men when there is concordance in drinking (i.e., either the man and woman were both drinking or were both not drinking).