The article “The role of institutional factors on on-campus reported rape prevalence” written by Stotzer & MacCartney examines the factors influencing levels of sexual assault at university and college campuses (2015). The authors argue that levels of sexual assault are linked to the presence of motivated offenders, specifically men in fraternities or on athletic teams. They also provide enough evidence relation to available victims, which includes the amount of women on campus and how residential the university is, and finally, the lack of guardianship on campus, which consists of the alcohol policy of the school and the number of law enforcement officials on campuses. The data presented was a combination of publicly accessible …show more content…
The article definitions provided of rape versus sexual assault are very problematic. The definition of sexual assault included acts of intercourse, penetration and unwanted genital contact, however states that this is done through coercion, not by force and is not rape (p. 465). This definition lacks clarity as any form of unwanted sexual penetration would be considered rape. In addition, the authors make reference to how certain personality traits that differ between those who, through their definitions, have committed rape versus those that have committed sexual assault, can be used to explain why these sexual assault perpetrators did not commit “full-blown rape” when in fact penetration did occur (pp. 473-474).
Furthermore, there is a very controversial assumption made. The authors argue that the difference between those who are sexual aggressors and are institutionalized versus those that are not, is that those who are outside of prison have more self control. In a society where many rapes simply go unreported and when such rapes are reported, it is often a great ordeal to prosecute, arguing that those who are free in the community have more self control would be highly