First year campus acquaintance rape education - Evaluating the impact of amandatory intervention

The current study was designed to evaluate the impact of First Year Campus Acquaintance Rape Education (FYCARE), a mandatory program for first year un dergraduates. First, questionnaires were administered to 48 FYCARE particip ants assessed immediately following workshop participation, 76 FYCARE parti cipants sampled through the unrelated context of introductory psychology co urses, and 67 students sampled through introductory psychology who had not yet attended their scheduled FYCARE workshop. Second, ostensibly unrelated telephone surveys were conducted with 93 students who participated in FYCAR E 4 to 6 months earlier and 77 first year students who had not yet attended their scheduled workshop. Results indicated a positive impact of participa tion on attitudes and judgments of a hypothetical scenario, but only when a ssessed immediately following workshop participation. In contrast, increase s in knowledge were maintained for a period of up to 7 weeks, and phone sun ey responses revealed an increase in the level of support for rape prevent ion efforts 4 to 6 months following program participation. Finally, superio r outcomes were observed among students involved in more than one education al program, thus highlighting the need for repeated intervention.