Beliefs and attitudes about men's alcohol-related sexual harassment and aggression (BAMASHA): Development and initial validation of a new scale

Background

Men's perpetration of sexual violence (SV) toward women in drinking venues is a pervasive yet understudied phenomenon with significant downstream consequences for women. Although men's negative attitudes and beliefs toward women play an important role in SV, current attitude measures are limited in that they do not focus on SV specific to drinking contexts, thereby precluding understandings of SV in this context. As such, we developed and evaluated a measure of beliefs and attitudes about men's alcohol-related sexual harassment and aggression (BAMASHA) toward women in drinking venues to better understand this ubiquitous problem.

Methods

Young heterosexual men (N = 330, M_age = 22.66, SD = 2.09) completed an online survey that included 82 BAMASHA items developed to assess eight theoretical dimensions/sub-dimensions derived from past research. The survey also measured sexual aggression perpetration in drinking venues and well-established correlates of SV including drinking patterns, rape myth acceptance, hostility toward women, stereotypes about drinking women, and alcohol expectancies regarding sexual behavior.

Results

Item analysis resulted in a 24-item inventory with exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses suggesting a unidimensional factor structure. The resultant measure and its 12-item short form also explained sexual aggression perpetration toward women in drinking venues when controlling for associated constructs.

Conclusions

Findings underscore the unique contributions of the BAMASHA for sexual aggression perpetration and its utility in the context of drinking venues compared to measures of attitudes and beliefs toward SV more generally.