Undergraduate Students as Bystanders to Sexual Violence Risks: Differences in Reported Intervention Opportunities and Behaviors by Racial Identity

Abstract

Although substantial research has been dedicated to understanding the demographic and psychosocial correlates of bystander intervention behavior related to sexual violence, as well as the effectiveness of bystander training programs, both lines of inquiry often fail to examine potential differences in bystander intervention opportunities and behavior based on students’ racial identity. Indeed, current research generally suffers from a lack of diversity in the study samples. Given this gap in the literature, the purpose of this study is to examine whether—and how—students’ racial identity (White, non-Hispanic, African American, Asian American, Hispanic and multiracial) is associated with their reported intervention opportunities and prosocial response as bystanders to sexual violence risks. In the fall of 2014, undergraduate students (N = 9,358) completed web-based surveys to assess bystander intervention opportunities and behavior for six high-risk situations. Tests of independence revealed racial identity was significantly associated with bystander opportunities for four of the six situations, and logistic regression revealed that White students had significantly higher odds of reporting these intervention opportunities, compared with students of color. Tests of independence revealed that racial identity was not significantly associated with bystander intervention behavior, although logistic regression analysis revealed Asian American students had significantly lower odds of reporting prosocial intervention response for one situation, compared with White counterparts. In response to growing concerns about campus sexual violence, institutions of higher education are increasingly adopting bystander training programs to engage students as prosocial helpers who can intervene in risk situations. In line with these findings, research of this nature should include samples that reflect the diversity of their campus communities, explore what types of opportunities students of color identify as potential for intervention, and ensure these situations are captured in bystander behavior measures used in the field.

Keywords

sexual assault alcohol and drugs anything related to sexual assault intervention prevention

Introduction

In response to growing concerns about campus sexual violence, institutions of higher education are increasingly adopting bystander training programs to engage students as prosocial helpers who can intervene in risk situations. Although substantial research has been dedicated to understanding the demographic and psychosocial correlates of prosocial intervention response (see Banyard, 2011), as well as the effectiveness of training programs on intervention behavior (see Jouriles, Krauss, Vu, Banyard, & McDonald, 2018; Katz & Moore, 2013), both lines of inquiry often failed to examine potential differences in intervention behavior based on students’ racial identity. Current research generally suffers from a lack of diversity in the study samples (Labhardt, Holdsworth, Brown, & Howat, 2017), despite the diversity of most campus communities. Scholars suggest that individuals’ definition of interpersonal violence is informed, in part, by sociocultural influences (Sokoloff & Dupont, 2005; Yoshihama, 1999). Thus, although rarely examined in this body of literature, racial/ethnic differences in prosocial bystander actions may be driven by underlying cultural differences in the conceptualization of violence, in turn, dictating response to sexual violence incidents (Banyard & Moynihan, 2011). Understanding these differences could guide the tailoring of bystander intervention training programming to increase bystander intervention behaviors among racially diverse student bodies. In light of the limited understanding within the bystander research field on how racial identity relates to intervention behavior, the purpose of this study is to examine whether—and how—students’ racial identity is associated with their reported intervention opportunities and prosocial response as bystanders to sexual violence risk situations.

Campus Sexual Violence

Before they graduate from college, nearly 20% of women will be sexually assaulted (Cantor et al., 2015). Although sexual violence is a concern for women of all ages, women in college are 5 times more likely to experience sexual violence than noncollege women (Kilpatrick, Resnick, Ruggiero, Conoscenti, & McCauley, 2007), and recent research shows that incidents of victimization are consistent across racial identities (Cantor et al., 2015; Krebs et al., 2016). Scholars have argued that some college campuses create an environment that appears to foster sexual violence (Martin, 2016) through factors such as high alcohol use (Abbey, 2002; Armstrong, Hamilton, & Sweeney, 2006) and the presence of some all-male peer groups with peer norms that support violence against women (DeKeseredy & Schwartz, 2013; Sanday, 2007).

Although the issue of campus sexual violence was first documented more than 70 years ago with the first study to examine the issue (Kirkpatrick & Kanin, 1957), research into this problem began in earnest after Koss et al.’s (1987) seminal investigation demonstrating the high percentages of women affected by sexual assault. The effects of sexual violence can include a range of problems from physical health issue such as unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections (Tjaden & Thoennes, 2006) to mental health issues, such as posttraumatic stress disorder, anxiety, and substance use (for a review see, Campbell, Dworkin, & Cabral, 2009) to lesser known effects on academic outcomes (Banyard, Demers, Cohn, & Ward, 2020; Jordan, Combs, & Smith, 2014; Mengo & Black, 2016). As such, institutions of higher education are under increasing public and legislative pressure to address the issue of campus sexual violence through primary prevention initiatives such as bystander training programs, found to be effective in increasing students’ willingness to intervene in situations of varying risk for sexual assault.

Bystander Intervention Opportunities and Responses

Bystander training programs work to engage the entire student community to intervene in incidents of sexual violence. Students’ prosocial interventions can take place to stop sexual assault before it occurs, directly stop an ongoing incident of sexual assault, or address sexual assault after it has occurred through actions such as supporting survivors of assault (McMahon & Banyard, 2012). Previous research has shown that bystanders have the opportunity to intervene in a variety of situations of varying risk for sexual violence (Hoxmeier, Flay, & Acock, 2016; McMahon & Banyard, 2012; McMahon, Palmer, Banyard, Murphy, & Gidycz 2015; Palmer, 2016), and training programs have found to be effective in increasing bystander efficacy, willingness or intent to intervene, and self-reported prosocial intervention (Jouriles et al., 2018; Katz & Moore, 2013).

The measurement of bystander behavior—and its influential variables—is complex and ever-evolving (McMahon et al., 2015). Early work focused on examining students’ intent to intervene in future risk situations, and, although from a theoretical perspective intentions are most proximal to behavioral performance (Ajzen, 1991), scholars highlight the problematic nature of relying on intent to intervene as an appropriate proxy for intervention behavior (Banyard, 2015; Banyard, Moynihan, Cares, & Warner, 2014; Hoxmeier, Acock, & Flay, 2017; Katz & Moore, 2013; McMahon et al., 2015; Murphy Austin, Dardis, Wilson, Gidycz, & Berkowitz, 2016). Increasingly, researchers have moved toward understanding potential influences of prosocial intervention and the effectiveness of bystander training programs by measuring intervention behavior.

Still, another issue regarding measurement of bystander behaviors recently arose within the field. Scholars argue that it is critical to measure opportunity to enact bystander intervention behaviors before asking if they did indeed intervene (Jouriles et al., 2018; McMahon et al., 2015; Murphy Austin et al., 2016). Bystander intervention behavior, relative to other health-related behaviors, is unique in that individuals can only intervene in risks when presented with the opportunity to do so (Bennett, Banyard, & Garnhard, 2014; Brown, Banyard, & Moynihan, 2014; McMahon et al., 2015; Hoxmeier et al., 2017). Without measuring students’ intervention opportunity, inquiring into bystander behavior cannot differentiate those individuals who do not intervene because they choose not to from those who did not have the opportunity. As such, previous investigations into bystander behavior that did not measure behavior relative to opportunity are challenged to draw meaningful conclusions about the characteristics—either demographic or psychosocial—associated with prosocial intervention behavior, a critical field of inquiry to identify students at-risk for low bystander engagement, as well as understanding mechanisms that support intervention that could serve as programmatic strategies in training programs.

Demographic Correlates of Opportunities and Intentions

The current literature on bystander behavior utilizing nonexperimental designs often examines the psychosocial correlates of bystander intentions and behaviors, and foundational research in this area suggests several important variables are potentially salient for prosocial behavior, importantly providing the basis for bystander training initiatives (Banyard, 2011). Although understanding how intervention efficacy or attitudes, for example, influence behavior is vastly important, individual-level characteristics—demographics—can also help shed light on who intervenes, and who does not, when presented with the opportunity to do so. Previous research has generally examined gender and age in relation to students’ intervention behavior. Women are typically found to report greater past prosocial intervention behavior (Banyard, 2008; Bennett et al., 2014; Brown et al., 2014; Burn, 2009; McMahon, 2010; Hoxmeier et al., 2017), though there have been mixed results regarding how age, or year in school, interacts with bystander behavior (Banyard & Moynihan, 2011; Brown et al., 2014; Hoxmeier et al., 2017). Because research measures generally ask about students’ bystander experiences since becoming a student at the institution, and depending on the timing of data collection, intervention opportunity and behaviors may look differently for first year students.

Given the majority of research in this area is conducted with predominantly White samples, and does not examine potential racial identity variation among the variables (e.g., Banyard et al., 2014; Murphy Austin et al., 2016; Yule & Grych, 2020), less is known about whether, and how, students’ bystander intervention opportunity and behavior differ based on racial identity. As institutions of higher education grow increasingly diverse, and recognizing that sexual violence affects students of all racial identities (Cantor et al., 2015), this represents a major gap in the existing bystander literature and current inquiry. To increase prosocial bystander intervention behavior, tailored campus programming, including bystander prevention efforts, are needed to address diverse student populations where risk opportunities may be more, or less, relevant and helping may look different across cultures (Banyard et al., 2014; Brown et al., 2014). Although extensive research has considered a variety of important variables and their influence on behavior, if the bulk of research focuses on White student populations, we cannot conclude such variables influence bystander behavior across racial identities. Thus, it is necessary to investigate whether racial identity is associated with intervention opportunity and behavior, as there may be factors that either inhibit certain groups of students from acting as prosocial bystanders while other factors might encourage prosocial bystander behavior (Banyard et al., 2014; Brown et al., 2014; Hoxmeier et al., 2017;Katz, Heisterkamp, & Fleming, 2011).

Sexual Violence, Bystander Behavior, and Racial Identity

In investigations of the association between racial identity and general helping behavior, not specifically prosocial bystander interventions, differences in helping are often examined between White and African American individuals only (Kunstman & Plant, 2008), where comparisons in helping are made in situations when the victim—or person in need of help—and the bystander are of different racial identities (Crosby, Bromley, & Saxe, 1980; Gaertner, Dovidio, & Johnson, 1982; Saucier, Miller, & Doucet, 2005). Moving from broader research on helping behavior to specific research into the association between prosocial bystander interventions and racial identity of the victim, Katz and colleagues (2017) found that White women reported weaker intentions to help a Black victim, compared with a White victim, at risk for sexual assault in party situations. Research examining bystander-related measures, regardless of the race of the victim or perpetrator, is limited and often mixed or contradictory with some studies finding no relationship between racial identities and helping behaviors (Frye, 2007).

Among studies examining bystander behavior in respect to students’ demographic characteristics, racial identity has rarely been analyzed in reference to bystander outcomes specifically related to sexual violence risk situations (Brewster & Tucker, 2016; Brown et al., 2014; Hoxmeier et al., 2017), yet represents an important area of study in light of research showing differing bystander behavior in nonsexual violence situations (Crosby et al., 1980; Gaertner et al., 1982; Kunstman & Plant, 2008; Saucier et al., 2005) and differing attitudes and perceptions on sexual violence in general (Fischer, 1987; Jimenez & Abreu, 2003; Mori, Bernat, Glenn, Selle, & Zarate, 1995).

To our knowledge, only four studies examined potential associations between racial identity and bystander behaviors for sexual violence risk incidents. One study examined African American and White bystanders (e.g., Brown et al., 2014) while another examined Asian/Pacific Islander and Hispanic-identified students, in addition to African American and White bystander (Hoxmeier et al., 2017). The other two remaining studies examined bystander behavior between White and “other” racially identified students, combining small samples of diverse student populations into one non-White category (Brewster & Tucker, 2016; Diamond-Welch, Hetzel-Riggin, & Hemingway, 2016).

Brewster and Tucker (2016) demonstrated that at the bivariate level, African American students were less likely report bystander intervention behaviors in a hypothetical situation than White-identified students and those who identified as “other” racial identity, but these results were not replicated in multivariate analyses. Brown and colleagues (2014) found that African American students self-reported more prosocial bystander behaviors and fewer missed opportunities to intervene than White students. The authors of the latter study also examined interactions between gender and racial identity and determined that White men were the least likely to intervene and African American women were most likely to intervene. Diamond-Welch and colleagues (2016) examined race/ethnicity differences in bystander behavior and found variation among White and non-White students, though differentiation among the “non-Caucasian” group was not made. Furthermore, intervention behavior was not measured relative to intervention opportunity. Hoxmeier and colleagues (2017) found that Asian/Pacific Islander students, compared with White students, reported fewer opportunities to intervene, although no difference in missed intervention opportunities. Conversely, African American and Hispanic students reported more missed intervention opportunities to intervene compared with White students. Although results regarding African American students’ behaviors differ from the findings of Brown and colleagues (2014), they were based on a small sample of African American students.

Taken together, these studies present an unclear picture of the effect of racial identity on bystander behavior in situations of sexual violence. At the multivariate level, one study found no effect of racial identity on bystander behavior (Brewster & Tucker, 2016). Although three other studies found differing and divergent findings for bystander behavior by race. Two studies demonstrated that non-White or African American students were more likely to intervene as prosocial bystanders (Brown et al., 2014; Diamond-Welch et al., 2016). Conversely, Hoxmeier and colleagues (2017) found that minority students had more missed opportunities to intervene when the situation presented itself. The mixed findings, combining of non-White students into one racial category, and the generally limited research on bystander behavior and racial identity in sexual violence risk situations underscores the need for further investigation in this area.

The Current Study

The current literature commonly suffers from an overreliance on racially homogeneous samples; that is, most of the research focuses on the experiences of White students. As such, little is known about bystander intervention opportunities and behaviors among students of color, which can shed light on how racial identity can, and should, be accounted for in field of inquiry, as well as promote the inclusion of students of color in this body of research and bystander training programs. Using cross-sectional data from a large sample of undergraduate students, this study explores whether students’ racial identity is associated with (a) opportunities to intervene in sexual violence risk situations and (b) bystander intervention behavior. Based on the gaps in the current literature, we posed the following research questions:

Research Question 1: Is students’ racial identity associated with reported bystander intervention opportunities?

Research Question 2: Is students’ racial identity associated with reported bystander intervention behavior?

Method

Procedures

The data for this study come from a larger campus climate assessment conducted online in November of 2014, at a large, public university in the Northeast. The current analysis utilized data from undergraduate students who were enrolled in the institution at the time the survey was administered. An intensive outreach campaign was conducted and included emails, print materials, social media messages, and informational stations in locations frequented by students (e.g., dining halls). The survey was anonymous and administered on-line. All participants were eligible for randomly selected cash prizes as an incentive for participation. All materials and procedures were approved by the University’s institutional review board.

Sample

The study sample focused on undergraduate students (n = 6,114), including 2,232 men (36.5%) and 3,882 (63.5%) women. With the exception of gender, where women represented a greater proportion of the sample (64% of the sample) compared with their representation in the university population (51% of the study body), the sample demographics are similar to the university’s population. The sample was racially diverse, with 45.8% (n = 2,801) White, non-Hispanic, 29.3% (n = 1,793) Asian American, 13.3% (n = 813) Hispanic, 7.7% (n = 473) African American, and 3.8% (n = 234) multiracial, non-Hispanic-identified students. See Table 1 for sample demographic information.

Table 1.

Sample Characteristics (n = 6,114).

	n (%)
Gender
Men	2,232 (36.5)
Women	3,882 (63.5)
Race/ethnicity
White, non-Hispanic	2,801 (45.8)
African American	473 (7.7)
Asian American	1,793 (29.3)
Hispanic	813 (13.3)
Multiracial, non-Hispanic	234 (3.8)
Class standing
Freshman	899 (14.7)
Sophomore	1,656 (27.1)
Junior	1,681 (27.5)
Senior	1,878 (30.7)

Measures

To assess reported intervention opportunities and past intervention behaviors, two scales were used, each containing the same six sexual violence situations. The six bystander situations were adapted from the Bystander Behavior Scale–Revised (BBS-R, McMahon et al., 2014). The risk situations used in this study were chosen to examine opportunities and bystander intervention behavior for high-risk situations. Items to assess students’ reported opportunities asked participants, since attending the institution: (a) Have you seen a group of students sexually intimidating/bothering someone in a parking lot or similar situation; (b) Have you seen a girl taking a drunk guy back to her room; (c) Have you seen a guy taking a drunk girl back to his room; (d) Have you seen a girl you didn’t know go to her room with a group of guys and heard her yelling for help; (e) Have you heard a friend say they planned to give alcohol to someone to get sex; and (f) Have you heard rumors that a friend forced someone to have sex? Participants could indicate any of the six situations they had witnessed with “Yes” and “No.”

To assess reported intervention behaviors, when a response of “Yes” was reported for any of the intervention opportunities noted above, one follow up item asked participants, “What did you do?” Response options included: (a) did nothing, it wasn’t my business; (b) did nothing because I wasn’t sure what to do; (c) confronted the situation directly; (d) went and got assistance from someone else; and (e) other (please specify). From these responses, we created a binary variable to examine gender differences in intervention: “Did something” and “Did nothing.” Students’ responses for “other” were examined, recoded, where appropriate, and included in their respective category. When students reported that they did intervene in a different way than provided in the survey item options, they were recoded as “Did something.” When students reported that they did not intervene for a different reason than provided in the survey item options, they were recoded as “Did nothing.”

Data Analysis

A total of 9,358 undergraduate students responded to the survey, for a 30% response rate. Of those, a number were removed from the analysis for failing the reliability check (n = 681), providing no valid responses (n = 78) because they were duplicates (n = 4), or were not between the ages of 18 to 24 (n = 455). For this study, students with missing data on any of the bystander variables (n = 1,245), as well as gender (n = 246), academic class standing (n = 814), racial identity (n = 57) were excluded from the analyses. Those with a racial identity other than White, non-Hispanic, African American, Asian American, Hispanic, or multiracial, non-Hispanic (n = 109) were also removed. The final analytic sample was 6,114 students.

To answer the first research question about bystander opportunities, we conducted Pearson’s chi-square tests of independence to examine the proportion of students who reported opportunities to intervene for each of the six risk situations and to determine whether opportunity was associated with to racial identity. Then, we conducted logistic regression analyses to examine students’ reported intervention opportunity, by racial identity (White, non-Hispanic, Asian American, Hispanic, African American, and multiracial, non-Hispanic), while controlling for academic standing (first year, beyond first year) and gender (women, men) based on the aforementioned literature. To answer the second research question about bystander intervention response, we conducted chi-square tests of independence to examine the proportion of students who reported they “did nothing” and “did something” when presented with the opportunity to intervene for each of the six risk situations and examine whether bystander response was associated with students’ racial identity. Then, we conducted logistic regression analyses to examine students’ reported bystander intervention response, by racial identity, accounting for covariates. Due to the limited literature in this area to suggest otherwise, we used White, non-Hispanic students as the comparison group based on sample size.

Results

Students’ Racial Identity and Reported Bystander Intervention Opportunities

The first research question explored whether bystander intervention opportunity was associated with students’ racial identity. Analysis showed that opportunity to intervene was associated with racial identity for four of the six risk situations (see Table 2), including witnessing “a group of students sexually intimidating/bothering someone in a parking lot or similar setting”; “a girl taking a drunk guy back to her room”; “a guy taking a drunk girl back to his room”; and “hearing a friend say they planned to give alcohol to someone to get sex.” For example, 19.05% (n = 90) African American–identified, 15.34% (n = 275) Asian American–identified, 22.22% (n = 189) Hispanic-identified, 23.37% (n = 52) multiracial-identified students, and nearly 30% (n = 830) of White-identified students reported to have “seen a girl taking a drunk guy back to her room,” χ²(4, 6114) = 131.5186, p = .000.

Table 2.

Students’ Reported Intervention Opportunities by Racial Identity, Chi-Square and Logistic Regression (n = 6,114).

	Opportunity% (n)	p Value	Unadjusted Odds Ratio (95% CI)	Adjusted Odds Ratio (95% CI)
Have you seen a group of students sexually intimidating/bothering someone in a parking lot or similar setting?
White, non-Hispanic	11.32 (317)		—	—
African American	8.46 (40)		0.72 [0.51, 1.02]^†	0.68 [0.48, 0.97]*
Asian American	5.19 (93)		0.43 [0.34, 0.54]***	0.43 [0.34, 0.55]***
Hispanic	9.84 (80)		0.86 [0.66, 1.11]	0.85 [0.65, 1.10]
Multiracial, non-Hispanic	9.40 (22)	<.001	0.81 [0.52, 1.28]	0.77 [0.49, 1.22]
Have you seen a girl taking a drunk guy back to her room?
White, non-Hispanic	29.63 (830)		—	—
African American	19.03 (90)		0.56 [0.44, 0.72]***	0.60 [0.47, 0.77]***
Asian American	15.34 (275)		0.43 [0.37, 0.50]***	0.43 [0.37, 0.51]***
Hispanic	22.39 (189)		0.68 [57, 0.82]***	0.71 [0.59, 0.85]***
Multiracial, non-Hispanic	22.22 (52)	<.001	0.68 [0.49, 0.93]*	0.71 [0.51, 0.98]*
Have you seen a guy taking a drunk girl back to his room?
White, non-Hispanic	44.59 (1,249)		—	—
African American	33.83 (160)		0.64 [0.52, 0.78]***	0.64 [0.52, 0.78]***
Asian American	27.33 (490)		0.47 [0.41, 0.53]***	0.47 [0.42, 0.54]***
Hispanic	36.04 (293)		0.70 [0.60, 0.82]***	0.71 [0.60, 0.83]***
Multiracial, non-Hispanic	35.04 (82)	<.001	0.67 [0.51, 0.89]**	0.66 [0.50, 0.88]**
Have you seen a girl you didn’t know go to her room with a group of guys and heard her yelling for help?
White, non-Hispanic	0.18 (5)		—	—
African American	0 (0)
Asian American	0.22 (4)		1.25 [0.34, 4.66]	1.28 [0.34, 4.80]
Hispanic	0 (0)
Multiracial, non-Hispanic	0.43 (1)	.437	2.4 [0.28, 20.63]	2.76 [0.32, 23.87]
Have you heard a friend say they planned to give alcohol to someone to get sex?
White, non-Hispanic	11.67 (327)			—
African American	9.30 (44)		0.78 [0.56, 1.08]	0.85 [0.61, 1.19]
Asian American	7.75 (139)		0.64 [0.52, 0.78]***	0.65 [0.53, 0.80]***
Hispanic	11.04 (90)		0.94 [0.74, 1.21]	0.98 [0.77, 1.26]
Multiracial, non-Hispanic	13.25 (31)	<.001	1.16 [0.78, 1.72]	1.22 [0.82, 1.82]
Have you heard rumors that a friend forced someone to have sex?
White, non-Hispanic	5.07 (142)		—	—
African American	2.33 (11)		0.45 [0.24, 0.83]*	0.45 [0.24, 0.83]*
Asian American	5.30 (95)		1.05 [0.80, 1.37]	1.07 [0.82, 1.40]
Hispanic	5.17 (42)		1.02 [0.72, 1.45]	1.03 [0.73, 1.47]
Multiracial, non-Hispanic	6.41 (15)	.074	1.28 [0.74, 2.22]	1.27 [0.73, 2.21]

Note. White, non-Hispanic racial identity is the referent group. Adjusted analysis includes academic year (0 = first year, 1 = beyond first year) and gender (0 = women, 1 = men). CI = confidence interval.

†

p < .1. *p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

Logistic regression revealed that differences in reported opportunities to intervene, by racial identity, remained after adjusting for covariates. African American (adjusted odds ratio [AOR] = 0.68; 95% confidence interval [CI] = [0.48, 0.97]) and Asian American (AOR = 0.43; 95% CI = [0.34, 0.55]) students had significantly less odds of report witnessing “a group of students sexually intimidating/bothering someone in a parking lot or similar setting,” compared with White, non-Hispanic students. Asian American (AOR = 0.65, 95% CI = [0.53, 0.80]) students were less likely to report hearing “a friend say they planned to give alcohol to someone to get sex” and African American students (AOR = 0.45, 95% CI = [0.24, 0.83]) had significantly less odds of reporting they “heard rumors that a friend forced someone to have sex,” compared with White, non-Hispanic students. All minority racial identity groups were significantly less likely to report witnessing both “a girl taking a drunk guy back to her room” and “a guy taking a drunk girl back to his room,” compared with White, non-Hispanic students.

Students’ Racial Identity and Reported Bystander Intervention Response

The second research question explored whether students’ reported bystander intervention response (“Did something” when presented with the opportunity) was associated with racial identity, and analysis showed one significant relationship between racial identity and bystander intervention response (see Table 3). Logistic regression analysis revealed that, after adjusting for covariates, Asian American students (AOR = 0.46, 95% CI = [0.27, 0.78]), had significantly less odds of reporting they “did something” when hearing “rumors that a friend forced someone to have sex,” compared with White, non-Hispanic students. Due to the small sample of students’ reporting to have witnesses “a girl you didn’t know go to her room with a group of guys and heard her yelling for help,” logistic regression was not conducted for this risk situation.

Table 3.

Students’ Reported Bystander Intervention Response by Racial Identity, Chi-Square and Logistic Regression (N = 10 − 2,471).

	Did Something% (n)	p Value	Unadjusted Odds Ratio (95% CI)	Adjusted Odds Ratio (95% CI)
Saw a group of students sexually intimidating/bothering someone in a parking lot or similar setting?
White, non-Hispanic	44.16 (140)		—	—
African American	52.50 (21)		1.40 [0.72, 2.71]	1.41 [0.73, 2.73]
Asian American	39.78 (37)		0.84 [0.52, 1.34]	0.82 [0.51, 1.32]
Hispanic	55.00 (44)		1.55 [0.94, 2.53]^†	1.54 [0.94, 2.53]^†
Multiracial, non-Hispanic	45.45 (10)	.283	1.05 [0.44, 2.51]	1.13 [0.47, 2.70]
Saw a girl taking a drunk guy back to her room?
White, non-Hispanic	7.97 (66)		—	—
African American	5.56 (5)		0.68 [0.27, 1.73]	0.64 [0.25, 1.63]
Asian American	8.00 (22)		1.00 [0.61, 1.66]	0.99 [0.60, 1.65]
Hispanic	9.32 (17)		1.19 [0.68, 2.08]	1.13 [0.65, 1.99]
Multiracial, non-Hispanic	8.00 (4)	.882	1.00 [0.35, 2.88]	0.95 [0.33, 2.73]
Saw a guy taking a drunk girl back to his room?
White, non-Hispanic	21.20 (264)		—	—
African American	19.38 (31)		0.89 [0.59, 1.35]	0.84 [0.55, 1.28]
Asian American	16.94 (83)		0.76 [0.58, 0.99]*	0.77 [0.58, 1.01]^†
Hispanic	18.43 (54)		0.84 [0.61, 1.16]	0.81 [0.58, 1.12]
Multiracial, non-Hispanic	26.83 (22)	.142	1.36 [0.82, 2.26]	1.31 [0.78, 2.17]
Saw a girl you didn’t know go to her room with a group of guys and heard her yelling for help?
White, non-Hispanic	80.0 (4)		—	—
African American	—	—	—	—
Asian American	75.0 (3)		—	—
Hispanic	—	—	—	—
Multiracial, non-Hispanic	0 (0)	.270	—	—
Heard a friend say they planned to give alcohol to someone to get sex?
White, non-Hispanic	52.29 (171)		—	—
African American	47.73 (21)		0.83 [0.44, 1.56]	0.81 [0.43, 1.52]
Asian American	42.45 (59)		0.67 [0.45, 1.00]^†	0.67 [0.45, 1.00]^†
Hispanic	54.44 (49)		1.09 [0.68, 1.74]	1.04 [0.65, 1.67]
Multiracial, non-Hispanic	54.84 (17)	.294	1.11 [0.53, 2.32]	1.04 [0.49, 2.19]
Heard rumors that a friend forced someone to have sex?
White, non-Hispanic	52.82 (75)		—	—
African American	54.55 (6)		1.07 [0.31, 3.67]	1.07 [0.32, 3.67]
Asian American	33.68 (32)		0.45 [0.26, 0.78]**	0.46 [0.27, 0.78]**
Hispanic	47.62 (20)		0.81 [0.41, 1.62]	0.81 [0.41, 1.62]
Multiracial, non-Hispanic	60.00 (9)	.041	1.34 [0.45, 3.96]	1.32 [0.45, 3.92]

†

p < .1. *p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

Discussion

The purpose of this study was to understand whether, and how, students’ racial identity was associated with bystander intervention opportunity and behavior, an understudied area in this field. The findings contribute to the literature in several meaningful ways, including the ability to examine racial identity beyond two groups, or combining non-White students into one category; to differentiate between interveners and noninterveners based on opportunity to do so; and to identify how absent the measures to assess bystander behavior relative to opportunity may inaccurately uncover differences in bystander response based on students’ racial identity. These results have important implications for future research in this area, as well as practical implications for initiatives aimed at engaging students as prosocial bystanders to intervene in sexual violence.

The results show that White, non-Hispanic students reported to have the opportunity to intervene in more types of risk situations, compared with students of color, for those examined here, yet bystander response did not differ based on racial identity, with the exception of one situation where Asian American students were less likely to report intervening, compared with White, non-Hispanic students. Although there exists little research on Asian American students’ attitudes toward sexual assault, in general, Mori and colleagues (1995) found their Asian American sample held more negative attitudes toward victims of sexual violence and were more likely to endorse rape myths, which has been found to impact bystander behavior (Banyard, 2008; Banyard & Moynihan, 2011; McMahon, 2010). Similarly, although Hoxmeier and colleagues (2017) found that Asian American students reported significantly less opportunities to intervene and less intent to intervene, compared with White counterparts, they found no difference in missed intervention opportunities. Perhaps attitudinal factors related specifically to postassault interaction with perpetrators of assault account for this different. Research on sexual violence and Asian/Pacific Islander students suggests that deeply embedded cultural norms such as fear of bringing shame to the community or loss of face may influence participants’ willingness to report instances where they or others experience sexual violence (Gilmore, Granato, Wilson, & George, 2016).

We found that African American students reported fewer types of opportunities to intervene but no difference in actual intervention behaviors, which differs both from Hoxmeier and colleagues (2017) who found African Americans students to report more missed intervention opportunities, compared with White students, and, similarly, from Brown and colleagues (2014) where African Americans reported more prosocial behaviors and fewer missed opportunities. Furthermore, our findings regarding the intervention opportunities and behaviors of Hispanic students differ from Hoxmeier and colleagues (2017) who found that Hispanic students reported no difference in intervention opportunities to intervene, compared with White students, but reported significantly more missed intervention opportunities. It should be noted, however, that differences in the analyses that may impact the how the findings in these studies relate to ours, such as the creation of composite variables from multiple items assessing bystander behavior compared with our examination of bystander opportunity and behavior at the item level. Differences in the findings across these studies may also result due to the differences in the demographic make-up of the campus communities. For instance, African American students represent a small proportion of the student body in the study of Hoxmeier and colleagues (2017), whereas they comprise a greater proportion of the student body in the study of Brown and colleagues (2014). Continued examination of these variables will increase understanding of how racial identity is associated with opportunity and behavior, as well as how findings may differ between campuses based on the demographic make-up for their student population.

Given that much of the bystander research does not measure behavior relative to opportunity, our findings on the differences in intervention opportunity based on racial identity underscore the importance of measuring opportunity. White, non-Hispanic students were significantly more likely to report having the opportunity to intervene in the four most commonly reported opportunities examined in this study, accounting for any potential variation based on gender and year in school. Most of the situations presented in the study involved party situations with alcohol. Given research that finds that White students typically consume alcohol in greater quantities than Asian and African American students (e.g., Aud, Fox, & KewalRamani, 2010), it may be that those situations are more prevalent for White, non-Hispanic students. Although a substantial body of literature has documented the role of alcohol as a risk factor for sexual victimization (see Lorenz & Ullman, 2016), the context in which it is consumed may vary based on racial identity. Many researchers have identified party situations and “hook up culture” as a context ripe for sexual assault due to large amounts of alcohol consumption and gendered sexual expectations (Sutton & Simons, 2015); however, many studies of these contexts rely on almost exclusively White samples. The BBS, and its revised version, have been used in various iterations in several studies with predominantly White samples and where racial/ethnic differences in opportunity were not examined (e.g., Banyard, 2008; Banyard et al., 2014; Banyard, Moynihan, & Plante, 2007); thus, further investigation is necessary to determine whether White students witness more risk situations, whether related to alcohol or not, or whether students of color have opportunities to intervene in different kinds of situations unexplored here. In particular, qualitative research with students from various racial and ethnic backgrounds would allow an exploration of what types of opportunities they identify as potential for intervention, and whether these are well-aligned with those situations presented in measures of bystander intervention typically used in the field. In pursuing this line of research, it will be important for investigators to employ culturally relevant methods, and to recognize that given the current climate, students from various racial and ethnic identities may feel hesitant to talk openly about issues that may identify problematic situations within their own cultural communities.

Limitations and Future Research

Although the findings make a meaningful contribution to the literature on bystander behavior, several limitations should be noted. First, our exploration into intervention opportunities and behaviors were a part of a larger campus climate investigation, and, as such, we were limited to those situations considered high-risk. Future research may consider investigating other sexual violence-related situations that encompass a broader spectrum. It is possible that minority students indeed have opportunities to intervene for situations unexamined in this study. Echoing assertions of other scholars in this field, however, research should avoid combining situations across the spectrum, as doing so limits the ability to account for varying opportunities (Banyard, 2015). Alternatively, measuring missed opportunities, such as in Brown et al. (2014) and Hoxmeier et al. (2017) allows for grouping behaviors while accommodating for differences in opportunities. In line with such, any investigation into students’ bystander behavior should include measures to capture intervention opportunities. Second, although we were able to examine racial identity beyond those in previous studies, we acknowledge that there exists great diversity within those identities. As investigations seek to be more inclusive of diverse student samples, the ability to examine relationships between identity and bystander experiences will necessitate large samples to accommodate the varying intervention opportunities students report. Our decision to use White, non-Hispanic students as the comparison group was based on the sample size of this group in our study and the limited literature suggesting a more appropriate alternative; it is not our intention to reinforce this group’s experience as normative, but rather, highlight the importance of ensuring bystander measures are relevant to diverse student groups.

As institutions of higher education undertake campus-wide survey initiatives, greater recruitment of minority students may improve the ability to examine racial identity in relation to these important variables. Not only do a wide range of racial and ethnic identities need to be included, but so too do other variables such as the level of identity with their race/ethnicity and acculturation (Gilmore et al., 2016). Third, we did not measure the frequency by which students engage in prosocial intervention behaviors for the opportunities they have, and, as such, we cannot conclude whether reported bystander response for the situations here are consistent when having multiple opportunities. Future research may consider measuring frequency of bystander intervention opportunities and behavior, particularly for assessing the effectiveness of bystander training programs. Finally, the racial identity of the (potential) perpetrators and (potential) victims were unexamined in this study, and as current research shows the potential for a difference in intervention response when the bystander and victims are not of the same racial identity (Hoxmeier et al., 2017), it is important to understand differences in bystander response when the victim/perpetrator and bystander are not of the same racial identity.

Conclusion

Research in demographic correlates and psychosocial influences of prosocial bystander behavior continues to become more nuanced in capturing salient variables for understanding differences between those who do and do not intervene in risk situations. Although headway has been made in understanding influences of bystander behavior, as well as the effectiveness of bystander training programs, the bulk of research focuses on White samples, despite the diversity of many institutions of higher education. Although the findings of this study did not uncover differences in students’ bystander intervention behavior based on racial identity, the findings did demonstrate meaningful differences in students’ intervention opportunities, underscoring both the need to measure behavior relative to opportunity as the lack thereof could results inaccurate conclusions about students’ engagement as bystanders. Furthermore, differences in students’ intervention opportunities uncover the need to investigate whether the nature of these differences reflect greater exposure to sexually violent situations among White students, related to alcohol consumption or other risk factors, or the irrelevance of the risk situations examined here among students of color, or a combination thereof. Importantly, research and programmatic efforts of this nature should strive to include minority groups in inquiry into the types of opportunities have to intervene in, to ensure the relevance of opportunities presented measures assessing bystander behavior.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Author Biographies

Jill C. Hoxmeier, PhD, MPH, CHES, is an assistant professor of Public Health in the Department of Health Sciences at Central Washington University.

Julia O’Connor, MSW, MPH, is a doctoral candidate at the Rutgers University School of Social Work.

Sarah McMahon, PhD, MSW, is an associate professor at the Rutgers University School of Social Work and associate director of the Center of Violence Against Women and Children.

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