MOHLER-KUO ET AL. 37 37 Correlates of Rape while Intoxicated in a National Sample

A RECENT DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE study esti-mated that a woman has between a one in four and one in five chance of being raped during her college years (Fisher et al., 2000). Koss and colleagues (1987) assessed the amount and type of unwanted sexual contact in a na-tional sample of 32 institutions of higher education. They found that more than 15 % of college women had experi-enced a completed rape since the age of 14, and an addi-tional 12 % had experienced attempted rape. Of these women, 17 % had experienced either rape or attempted rape in the previous year. Abbey (2002) reviewed the literature and concluded that similar prevalence rates have been found in studies conducted at colleges throughout the United States (Abbey et al., 1996a; Copenhaver and Grauerholz, 1991; Mills and Granoff, 1992; Muehlenhard and Linton, 1987). Alcohol-related sexual assault is a common problem among college students (Abbey, 2002). Previous studies have shown that alcohol use is associated with at least 50% of sexual assaults on female college students (Abbey, 2002