Program Profile: Enhanced Assess, Acknowledge, Act Sexual Assault Resistance Program (Canada)

This is an educational, skills-based workshop for first-year female college students. The program is designed to teach young women how to assess risk, overcome barriers in acknowledging danger, and engage in self-defense to reduce the risk of sexual assault. The program is rated Effective. The program showed a statistically significant reduction in the risk of completed and attempted rape, nonconsensual sexual acts, and attempted coercion. There was no impact on the risk of attempted coercion.

An Effective rating implies that implementing the program is likely to result in the intended outcome(s).

This program's rating is based on evidence that includes at least one high-quality randomized controlled trial.

This program's rating is based on evidence that includes either 1) one study conducted in multiple sites; or 2) two or three studies, each conducted at a different site. Learn about how we make the multisite determination.

Program Goals/Target Population

The Enhanced Assess, Acknowledge, Act (EAAA) Sexual Assault Resistance program is an educational, skills-based workshop for first-year female college students in Ontario, Canada. Program participants learn how to assess risk from acquaintances, overcome emotional barriers in acknowledging danger, and engage in verbal and physical self-defense to reduce the risk of sexual assault.

Program Components

The EAAA program consists of four, 3-hour educational sessions. The program is provided in a university workshop setting and includes activities such as educational games, mini-lectures, facilitated discussion, and application and practice activities. This version of the program builds on the Basic Assess, Acknowledge, Act (AAA) Sexual Assault Resistance program by including a sexuality and relationship unit.

• Unit 1 (Assess) involves improving risk-assessment skills and developing practices and problem-solving strategies to reduce the advantages of the person who perpetrated the crime.
• Unit 2 (Acknowledge) involves improving young women’s ability to quickly acknowledge danger in coercive situations, overcome emotional barriers to resisting sexual advancement, and resist verbal coercion.
• Unit 3 (Act) offers options for resistance to unwanted sexual advancements, including through a Wen-Do martial arts self-defense training. The unit focuses on common sexual assault situations involving acquaintances and overcoming obstacles to resistance when the attacker is physically larger than the female victim.
• Unit 4 (Sexuality and Relationships) works to incorporate lessons from the previous units and apply them to participants’ own lives to promote safe sex practices and to increase sexual knowledge. The unit incorporates both the slang and scientific terms for a wide range of sexual activities beyond intercourse; provides a context for women to explore their sexual attitudes, values, and desires; and helps them to develop a means for healthy sexual communication.

Program Theory

The EAAA program is grounded in the cognitive–ecological model developed by Nurius and Norris (1996), which connects environmental and psychological factors to women’s responses to sexual assault. The program also draws on work by Ullman (1997) regarding successful rape-defense strategies.

Study 1

Senn and colleagues (2015) conducted a randomized controlled trial to evaluate the impact of the Enhanced Assess, Acknowledge, Act (EAAA) Sexual Assault Resistance program on sexual assault measures at the 1-year follow up among 451 female university students, from September 2011 to February 2013. The treatment group (n = 451) and control group (n = 442) consisted of first-year female college students, 17 to 24 years, at one large university and two midsized universities in Ontario, Canada. While the treatment group was enrolled in the sexual assault resistance program, the control group had access to sexual assault brochures similar to those that would be available in a campus clinic or counseling center. 

The average age of EAAA program participants was 18.5, and most program participants (72.1 percent) were white and identified as heterosexual (91.8 percent). The average age of control group participants was also 18.5, and most program participants (73.8 percent) were white and identified as heterosexual (91.6 percent). There were no significant differences between the groups on baseline characteristics, except for nonconsensual contact. Control group students were more likely to have experienced nonconsensual sexual contact than treatment group students. 

The primary outcome, completed rape, was measured via the Sexual Experiences Survey-Short Form Victimization (SES-SFV) at the 1-year follow up. Other outcomes, also measured using the SES-SFV, included attempted rape, nonconsensual sexual acts, coercion, and attempted coercion. The outcome data was examined using a modified intention-to-treat population (which included participants who completed post-randomization surveys). Kaplan–Meier failure curves (indicating the cumulative percentage of completed rapes against women in the respective groups) and log-rank tests were used to compare the incidence of completed rape between the EAAA treatment group and control group. The other outcomes were examined using discrete-time survival analyses, which used a complementary log–log regression model. Subgroup analyses were conducted to determine the potential effect of previous victimization on program outcomes.

The entire cost of implementing the Enhanced Assess, Acknowledge, Act (EAAA) Sexual Assault Resistance program for 1 year is estimated at $37,660 and is dependent on facilitator salaries and transportation costs for training. <br><br> The EAAA Train the Trainer workshop educates campus/community trainers on recruiting and training EAAA facilitators and costs $3,000. Workshop attendees receive 6 days of in-person training; licensing for 3 years; three, 3-hour Webinars monthly; 1 year of technical support; the EAAA Campus Trainer Manual; three sets of facilitator manuals; and all other necessary materials for implementing the program. <br><br> More information on the cost breakdown for this program is available at http://sarecentre.org/

Information on becoming an Enhanced Assess, Acknowledge, Act (EAAA) Sexual Assault Resistance Program Facilitator is available at following website: http://sarecentre.org.

Subgroup Analysis

Senn and colleagues (2015) conducted subgroup analyses to determine the potential effect of previous victimization on program effects. Participants in the control group who had been previously victimized were at a greater risk of being victims of completed rape, compared with participants in the control group who had no history of victimization. This difference was statistically significant. Participants in the control group who had been previously victimized also had a higher risk of being victims of completed rape, compared with participants in the treatment group who had been previously victimized. This difference was statistically significant.

These sources were used in the development of the program profile:

These sources were used in the development of the program profile:

Nurius, Paula S., and Jeanette Norris. 1996. “A Cognitive Ecological Model of Women’s Response to Male Sexual Coercion in Dating.” Journal of Psychology & Human Sexuality 8(1-2):117–39.

Rozee, Patricia D., and Mary P. Koss. 2002. “Rape: A Century of Resistance.” Psychology of Women Quarterly 25:295–311. 

Senn, Charlene Y. 2013. “Education on Resistance to Acquaintance Sexual Assault: Preliminary Promise of a New Program for Young Women in High School and University.” Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science 45(1):24–33.

Senn, Charlene Y., Stephanie S. Gee, and Jennifer Thanke. 2011. “Emancipatory Sexuality Education and Sexual Assault Resistance: Does the Former Enhance the Latter?” Psychology of Women Quarterly 35(1):72–91.

Ullman, Sarah E. 1997. “Review and Critique of Empirical Studies of Rape Avoidance.” Criminal Justice and Behavior 24:177–204.

Following are CrimeSolutions-rated programs that are related to this practice:

Sexual Assault Education Programs on College Campuses

This practice comprises programs that are designed to reduce the prevalence of sexual assaults on college campuses by reducing the rape-supportive ideology for those who may potentially perpetrate a crime, while increasing potential victims’ knowledge and awareness of risky situations, and thereby their safety. The practice is rated Effective for reducing rape attitudes (such as acceptance of rape myths and victim blaming) and rape-related attitudes (such as sex-role stereotyping and adversarial

Evidence Ratings for Outcomes

	Attitudes & Beliefs - Rape-related Attitudes
	Attitudes & Beliefs - Rape Attitudes

Why might a practice's outcome ratings differ from the ratings of specific programs encompassed by that practice?