Multi-College Bystander Intervention Evaluation for Violence Prevention

The 2013 Campus Sexual Violence Elimination Act requires U.S. colleges to provide bystander-based training to reduce sexual violence, but little is known about the efficacy of such programs for preventing violent behavior. This study provides the first multiyear evaluation of a bystander intervention's campus-level impact on reducing interpersonal violence victimization and perpetration behavior on college campuses.

First-year students attending three similarly sized public university campuses were randomly selected and invited to complete online surveys in the spring terms of 2010-2013. On one campus, the Green Dot bystander intervention was implemented in 2008 (Intervention, n=2,979) and two comparison campuses had no bystander programming at baseline (Comparison, n=4,132). Data analyses conducted in 2014-2015 compared violence rates by condition over the four survey periods. Multivariable logistic regression was used to estimate violence risk on Intervention relative to Comparison campuses, adjusting for demographic factors and time (2010-2013).

Interpersonal violence victimization rates (measured in the past academic year) were 17% lower among students attending the Intervention (46.4%) relative to Comparison (55.7%) campuses (adjusted rate ratio=0.83; 95% CI=0.79, 0.88); a similar pattern held for interpersonal violence perpetration (25.5% in Intervention; 32.2% in Comparison; adjusted rate ratio=0.79; 95% CI=0.71, 0.86). Violence rates were lower on Intervention versus Comparison campuses for unwanted sexual victimization, sexual harassment, stalking, and psychological dating violence victimization and perpetration (p<0.01).

Green Dot may be an efficacious intervention to reduce violence at the community level and meet Campus Sexual Violence Elimination Act bystander training requirements.

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By:  Coker AL1, Bush HM2, Fisher BS3, Swan SC4, Williams CM5, Clear ER6, DeGue S7.

• 1Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, College of Medicine, University of Kentucky, Lexington, Kentucky. Electronic address: ann.coker@uky.edu.
• 2Department of Biostatistics, College of Public Health, University of Kentucky, Lexington, Kentucky.
• 3School of Criminal Justice, College of Education, Criminal Justice and Human Services, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio.
• 4Department of Psychology and Women's and Gender Studies Program, College of Arts and Sciences, University of South Carolina, Columbia, South Carolina.
• 5Department of Health Behavior, College of Public Health, University of Kentucky, Lexington, Kentucky.
• 6Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, College of Medicine, University of Kentucky, Lexington, Kentucky.
• 7Research and Evaluation Branch, Division of Violence Prevention, CDC, Atlanta, Georgia. 

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