Sexual Violence Disclosures in Latina Women: How Does Regret Play a Role in Disclosing?
Viviana Lizarraga- Fort Hays State University
Faculty Sponsor: Dr. April Park
Sexual assault is a prevalent issue among women, especially minority women. However, cultural beliefs appear to get in the way of disclosing such traumatizing information. Although the Latino culture is understudied, a few things are known about the culture that may deter survivors from telling anyone. Additionally, the time between the sexual assault and the disclosure has been found to influence the types of reactions and symptoms the survivor experiences. Regret has been found to be the most common emotion related to disclosing sexual assault. However, there is a gap in the literature connecting ethnicity, disclosure and feelings of regret.
Sexual Violence Disclosures in Latina Women: How Does Regret Play a Role in Disclosing?- Viviana Lizarraga
I truly appreciate you highlighting an area that needs more attention while also advocating for Hispanic victims of sexual assault. Do you plan on expanding on this literature review and doing a study incorporating the variables you talked about (i.e., ethnicity, regret, self-disclosure, etc.)? If so, I look forward to hearing about it!
Hi Haley! I plan to conduct more research investigating the social and cultural barriers of reporting a sexual assault in the Hispanic community. However, I have other variables in mind. Rather than regret and self disclosure, I want to look at depressive symptoms. It’s a work in progress, but I definitely plan to present it next year! Thanks!
Great job! I thought your presentation was extremely interesting! I think that this is a very important topic to investigate. The future direction you discuss with depressive symptoms sounds great! Great work.
Really important cross-cultural work. I hope you keep pursuing it. If you were to give advice to a counselor or therapist who wanted to be an effective advocate/therapist for a Latino(a) survivor of assault, what particular cultural norms/beliefs/practices would you suggest that counselor educate themselves on? You mention several in your poster; any in particular you think would be of especially high value to a counselor/therapist who is working with a Latina survivor if the counselor is less familiar with Latino culture and norms? Thanks.