This is the first study of its kind to integrate empirical data from college men who reported a childhood sexual experience with a significantly older person with qualitative accounts of their perceptions and adaptations to these sexual interactions. The purpose was to delineate between those experiences that were clearly perceived as abusive, versus those incidents that were judged to be more positive. Descriptive accounts of these events, along with independent measures of current interpersonal functioning and adherence to hypermasculine beliefs and attitudes, provided several sources from which to ascertain internal consistency or discrepancies in reporting. This study shows that 18% of male college students are willing to report such a childhood sexual experience (CSE), with an equal ratio of young males engaging with an older male or female. Students who disclosed such a sexual event were more likely to come from conflictual family homes, to identify higher levels of sexual dysfunction, and lower levels of sexual self-esteem. They were also likely to engage in more masturbatory activity and in less direct sexual interactions with others. Boys who were adolescents at the time of the CSE were more likely to have their sexual development arrested, which incurred substantial impairments to their sexual self-identity. This study also confirms that boys who have had sexual experiences as children with older women are far more likely to perceive these experiences as positive and beneficial in their lives. The findings from this project assert that future empirical research and clinical interventions with this population needs to allow men more open-ended opportunities to describe and self-define a wide variety of childhood sexual experiences, free of biased language (e.g. abuse, victim, or molestation). With a self-created framework within which to evaluate childhood sexual interactions, men can begin to reflect upon how their own past sexual experiences influence their current interpersonal and sexual adjustment. These conversations will hopefully lead to more open dialogues about power; sexual, personal, interpersonal, and community power--its uses and abuses. (Abstract shortened with permission of author.)

The purpose of this study was to delineate the role of race in the prediction of at-risk status for pregnancy among Black and White high school females from low socioeconomic backgrounds. Research findings relative to adolescent pregnancy were assimilated into a proposed three factor model of pregnancy risk which included: Knowledge and Attitude toward Sexuality and Childbearing, Current Life Situation, and Opportunity for Sex. A questionnaire was developed to assess risk factors within the structure of the three model factors. The questionnaire examined the social, familial, and personal variables that influence a teen's sexual activity. The questionnaire was administered to 152 high school females aged 14-19. It was hypothesized that: (1) at-risk status for pregnancy was associated with high risk scores on the model variables and factors; (2) Black subjects would receive higher risk scores on the Knowledge and Attitude toward Pregnancy and Childbearing factor than White students and that Current Life Situation and Opportunity for Sex would predict pregnancy status but show no racial differentiation; (3) if the second hypothesis was correct, a differential pattern of pregnancy risk by race would result that could be incorporated into a model that discriminates risk status by race. The scores on the variables were analyzed through the use of: multivariate tests of significance (MANOVA), univariate $F$-tests, and discriminant function analyses. Additionally, factor analysis was used to assess the proposed model and develop new models for specific application. Not all hypotheses were accepted. Pregnancy status was predicted by the first hypothesis with findings reaching significance. On hypothesis 2, White pregnant subjects were more at-risk than other groups followed by Black pregnant subjects, Black never-pregnant subjects and, finally, White never pregnant-subjects. The questionnaire identified differential patterns for each racial group which validated the use of a stepwise discriminant analysis to help discriminate pregnancy risk status by race. The use of discriminant analysis derived variables increased prediction of pregnancy accuracy to 98.48% for Black subjects and 94.52% for White subjects. The need for replication studies and investigations of other racial and ethnic groups is discussed.

Statement of purpose. The purpose of this study was to explore through in-depth interviewing the impact of childhood experiences on secondary teachers who were raised in alcoholic homes, and to raise the awareness of school administrators and secondary teachers about the characteristics of Adult Children of Alcoholics (ACoAs). This research examined how those experiences influenced teachers' feeling of self, their interpersonal relationships, and their lives in the school workplace. The process. Thirty-three teacher volunteers were drawn from three large secondary schools in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. All participants were asked to be interviewed about their childhood experiences, supply family background data, take an Attitude Audit Questionnaire, and a Gregorc Style Delineator. All participants' names were coded to protect the rights and welfare of the volunteers. Their principals were asked to identify which teachers on their staff were the most controlling, which teachers viewed the world in terms of black or white, who were the most sensitive to criticism, the most isolated, the most responsible, and who most desperately want to please. The findings. Of the thirty-three volunteers, twenty-six teachers self-disclosed in their interviews that they had grown up in a home where there was at least one parent who was a problem drinker. Those ACoAs were affected by their childhood experiences and continue to use past survival tactics in their adult lives. Data suggests that these adults experience problems in interpersonal relationships with their peers and their supervisors. These teachers did not respond in positive ways to their principals, appeared more serious than their colleagues, less trusting of their supervisors, and were more rigid in their attitudes and behaviors than non-ACoA teachers in the study. Conclusions. ACoA teachers work in the secondary schools of Massachusetts, and they exhibit similar symptoms and behaviors to ACoAs in other professions. Data suggests that a significant number of ACoAs may exist in every secondary school. If so, large numbers of ACoAs in a secondary school could negatively effect teacher morale in that school.

The role of the Resident Assistant (RA) has assumed special prominence during the last thirty years, as theories of student development have promoted the practice of peer education, particularly in residence halls. RAs have been given a long list of tasks and job expectations that can be generally categorized within peer counseling and policy enforcing functions. Some researchers and writers in the field of student development and residence hall ecology have argued that with proper training and supervision, RAs can adequately fulfill their assigned duties while simultaneously matriculate, fulfilling their own personal undergraduate academic and social needs. This assumption is presently under scrutiny, as information from cognitive development regarding late adolescent epistemology questions the readiness of these students to be able to perform simultaneously in all of their roles. In particular, the role of enforcing university rules and regulations with many floormates who are also peers and friends presents RAs with levels of conflict that may stem from their current cognitive developmental level, thus limiting the ways they negotiate conflict during enforcement activities. The result may be a mis-match of person to task. Some undergraduate RAs may not be ready to carry out their most developmentally challenging task of enforcing campus policy with peers to whom they have ties of support and friendship. The purpose of this study is to investigate the possibility of certain behavioral trends in the ways RAs negotiate conflict with their peers while enforcing university policy based on their tested cognitive developmental level. By administering two production-type developmental assessments and one preference-type conflict mode inventory, as well as performing individual interviews of selected RAs, I examine possible mis-matches and matches of RAs with their roles, particularly that of policy enforcement with peers.