Drug- or alcohol-facilitated, incapacitated, and forcible rape in relationship to mental health among a national sample of women.

Zinzow HM, Resnick HS, Amstadter AB, McCauley JL, Ruggiero KJ, Kilpatrick DG. Drug- or alcohol-facilitated, incapacitated, and forcible rape in relationship to mental health among a national sample of women. Journal of interpersonal violence. 2010 Dec 1; 25(12):2217-36.

Dimensions for VA is a web-based tool available to VA staff that enables detailed searches of published research and research projects.

If you have VA-Intranet access, click here for more information vaww.hsrd.research.va.gov/dimensions/

VA staff not currently on the VA network can access Dimensions by registering for an account using their VA email address.    Search Dimensions for VA for this citation
* Don't have VA-internal network access or a VA email address? Try searching the free-to-the-public version of Dimensions

Search for Abstract from PubMed

---

Abstract:

Rape is a well-established risk factor for mental health disorders such as posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression. However, most studies have focused on forcible rape tactics and have not distinguished these from tactics that involve drug or alcohol intoxication. The authors' aim was to examine correlates of PTSD and depression in a community sample of women, with particular emphasis on evaluating the unique effects of lifetime exposure to three specific rape tactics. A nationally representative sample of 3,001 noninstitutionalized, civilian, English- or Spanish-speaking women (aged 18-86 years) participated in a structured telephone interview by use of Computer-Assisted Telephone Interviewing (CATI) technology. Multivariable models showed that history of drug or alcohol-facilitated rape tactics (OR = 1.87, p < .05) and history of forcible rape tactics (OR = 3.46, p < .001) were associated with PTSD. History of forcible rape was associated with depression (OR = 3.65, p < .001). Forcible rape tactics were associated with a number of factors that may have contributed to their stronger association with mental health outcomes, including force, injury, lower income, revictimization history, and labeling the event as rape. The results underscore the importance of using a behaviorally specific assessment of rape history, as rape tactic and multiple rape history differentially predicted psychopathology outcomes. The association between drug- or alcohol-facilitated rape tactics and PTSD suggests that these are important rape tactics to include in assessments and future studies.