The Complex Relationship: Alcohol and Sexual Assault Perpetration

This essay delves into the intricate relationship between alcohol and sexual assault, examining how alcohol may influence the perpetration of sexual violence. The student analyzes viewpoints from five scholarly articles, focusing on key arguments, methodologies, and conclusions regarding alcohol-induced versus non-alcohol-induced sexual assault. The essay highlights the debate among scholars on whether alcohol is a catalyst for sexual assault, with some emphasizing its role and others considering it a less significant factor compared to moral values and vulnerability. The essay also critiques the consistent portrayal of women as victims and men as perpetrators across the research, suggesting a need for further investigation to address the identified gaps. The references include studies by Zawacki et al. (2003), Pegram et al. (2018), Relyea & Ullman (2015), Testa and Cleveland (2016), and Kirwan et al. (2016).

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RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN ALCOHOL AND SEXUAL ASSAULT
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Debauchery, substance and sex abuse, is one of the social evils that is driving the youths
of today’s generation to their doom. Uncontrolled consumption of alcohol can lead to young
individuals to a lot of criminal and immoral activities. Momentary pleasures and indulgences are
not supposed to lead an individual to doom, if indulged in judiciously. The central thesis
statement of this particular essay shall be to determine how alcohol induced perpetration of
sexual violence is different from perpetration of sexual assaults which are not induced by
alcohol. In the following sections the discussion shall be focusing upon the points of view
provided by five chosen scholarly pieces of literature to analyze the issue of perpetration of
alcohol induced sexual abuse. The focus shall be on the key arguments that the authors make to
substantiate the difference between alcohol induced sexual assault and the ones which are not
induced by alcohol, the methodology used, the analysis and the inferences arrived at.
Zawacki et al (2003) in their article try to make the point that an approximation of 50
percentage of the sexual assaults perpetrated have taken place under the influence of alcohol.
They evidentially try to prove that over 95 percentage of the victims of alcohol induced sexual
assault have been women, and an overwhelming majority of the perpetrators were men. In their
definition of sexual assault they have tended to define it as an uncalled for behaviour which is
perpetrated to violate the bodily integrity, modesty and autonomy of a person. Rape and
molestation are the two forms of sexual assaults that they have identified. They use the
combination of quantitative and qualitative methodology to conduct their research and arrive at
their inferences. The qualitative research conducted by them had used college students as
samples. One group consisted of alcohol induced sexual abusers and the other set of abusers
were not alcohol induced. The user of Popper’s Falsification theory is quite evident. Their
inference that there is no fundamental difference between alcoholic and non alcoholic sex

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abusers, as they are bound by a serious lack in the moral values, is similar to the observations of
the previous researchers (Zackawi et al., 2003).
Pegram et al (2018) conduct their research on understanding the difference between
sexual abuse under the influence of alcohol and sexual abuse without, by trying to understand the
level of vulnerability of women under the influence of alcohol and sober women. Through that
they had tried to understand the difference between the issue of alcohol induced sexual abuse and
sexual abuse without the alcoholic influence, from a different angle. They confer that most of the
studies try to study the propensity of sober and alcoholic men to victimize women, while they
wanted to understand the plight of alcoholic and sober women at the hands of abusive men. The
victim is assumed in their research as women and the perpetrators being men. They conduct a
quantitative research, in which they survey the behavioural and value perceptions of men. In the
cross sectional survey conducted by them, the sample size of men had been 548 in number. The
inference which they derive shows that the propensity of men to extend sexually abusive
behaviour is equal for both the sober women and women under the influence of alcohol. The
men surveyed had expressed that the women in general were quite vulnerable irrespective of the
fact whether they are drunk or not. That is the conclusion which they have reached in general.
However, the surveyed men had also given indications that women who fall under the category
being under the influence of alcohol were relatively more vulnerable. The men might also cause
the women to be sedated so that they lose their senses and strength to fight back sexual assaults,
and take advantage of the situation (Pegram et al., 2018).
Relyea & Ullman (2015) also use alcoholic and non alcoholic women victims of sexual
assault as samples to substantiate the difference between alcohol induced sexual abuse and
sexual abuse not involving alcohol as a catalyst. They use the qualitative methodology to

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conduct their research. They reach the conclusion that alcohol had been a key factor in the
woman getting sexually assaulted. They also argue that women victims who were sober had
received better support while the alcoholic women victims had been at the receiving end of
apathy. Thus there is a discrimination between the two categories, and women tend to become
vulnerable under the influence of alcohol. They also state in their conclusion that women who
have been assaulted sexually under the influence of alcohol were more likely to be discreet in
fear of social judgement than the ones who have been sober at the time when the sexual assault
had taken place (Relyea & Ullman, 2015).
Testa and Cleveland (2016) tries to assess the role of alcohol in driving men to commit
acts of sexual assault. That is how they have addressed the issue of difference between alcohol
induced sexual assault and sexual assaults having no relevance for alcohol. Like the scholarly
articles chosen above, Testa and Cleveland (2016) seem to be contend with the fact that women
are always supposed to be the victim and the men the perpetrators. They use the qualitative
methodology to conduct their research, following the deductive approach. Their inference is a
somewhat appropriation of the existing literature. They conclude that alcohol is not necessarily
an agent that could drive a man to commit sexual assaults, rather, as they contend contrary to
Zawacki et al (2003) that sober men have been convicted of sexual assaults more than men who
have been under the influence of alcohol (Testa & Cleveland, 2016).
In analyzing the difference between the sexual assault alcoholic and non-alcoholic men
Kirwan et al (2016) made the point that the issue can be understood by considering alcoholic sex
abusers and non-alcoholic repeat offenders, whom they have surveyed in their research following
a combination of data analysis and quantitative methodologies. On interviewing eighty men,
Kirwan et al (2016) like Zackawi et al (2003) infer that alcohol might not be the major reason

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behind committing of sexual assaults but they are nevertheless an important factor. Their
observations conclude that at least one of the partners have been involved in drinking when the
assault had taken place in most cases and sober men are less likely to sexually assault sober
women (Kirwan et al., 2016).
At the concluding section it can be thus said that the scholars are divided upon whether
alcohol is a catalyst in enabling the perpetration of sexual assaults with a rate of expediency.
Some say very decisively that alcohol consumption is responsible for sexual assaults, while some
others say that it is one of the factors and not the most important factor. Some other scholars say
that alcohol plays no role in the instances of sexual assaults and consider erosion of moral values
and the propensity of humans to exploit the vulnerable ones majorly responsible to commit acts
of sexual violence. Hence the relationship between alcohol consumption and sexual assaults have
been differently portrayed by different sets of scholars, thus making it difficult to arrive at a
definite conclusion and affirm whether the two are actually related or not. It also makes it
difficult to arrive at a conclusion whether there is a difference between alcohol induced sexual
assault and sexual assault conducted at the state of sobriety. However the intriguing fact is that
all the researches cited in the essay have tend to project women as the victims and men as
perpetrators thereby ignoring the possibility of exploring the alternatives. This calls for more
researches in the area, to address the lacuna effectively.

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References
Kirwan, M., Parkhill, M. R., Schuetz, B. A., & Cox, A. (2016). A Within-Subjects Analysis of
Men’s Alcohol-Involved and Nonalcohol-Involved Sexual Assaults. Journal of
interpersonal violence, 0886260516670179.
Pegram, S. E., Abbey, A., Helmers, B. R., Benbouriche, M., Jilani, Z., & Woerner, J. (2018).
Men who sexually assault drinking women: similarities and differences with men who
sexually assault sober women and nonperpetrators. Violence against women, 24(11),
1327-1348.
Relyea, M., & Ullman, S. E. (2015). Measuring social reactions to female survivors of alcohol-
involved sexual assault: The Social Reactions Questionnaire–Alcohol. Journal of
interpersonal violence, 30(11), 1864-1887.
Testa, M., & Cleveland, M. J. (2016). It Depends on How You Look at It: The Role of Alcohol
in Men’s Sexual Aggression Perpetration. Journal of studies on alcohol and drugs, 78(1),
18-19.