Sunday, April 20, 2008
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Sunday, April 6, 2008
TJ Demos Lecture
I know he was commenting on work concerning globalization/progress and artists dealing with it and he said that globalization can only be a term of ambiguity and ambivalence.
I did like one thing he said particularly, "we should think about people getting into the gallery and not as much getting images to people by TV/Internet." Yet, while I like this idea, I don't completely agree with it. It seems delusional to me to think that the mass population is just going to get up and start actively searching out and going to galleries. They have to have a reason and to get them to do this and give them this reason you have to reach them first (by mass media usually). And why wouldn't you want to display your work or message in the mass media, the more people it reaches the better. I don't know, it seems like a catch 22 to me.
continued....
2
So, As I have discussed with you in our last meeting, I am continuing working on and editing down the images that I showed you. I am, as I said, attempting to make them seem almost unrealistic and formally impossible, therefore beautifying this place that I grew up in, not only for myself, but for others. I definitely have enough images to work with and I have priced the prints that I want to get for the show, as well as the supplies I will need to make light boxes. I do have a few questions though, like, which one out of the 1 and 2, do you prefers (above)? They are both of the same place but you were saying that you liked the pictures that were panned out less. What is your opinion?
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
updated bio
Bio
Thus far, my artistic career has been a montage of visual experiments consisting various different mediums and subject matters. Yet, my strongest and best explored medium, which I have spent the majority of my schooling building upon, has been photography. Within this medium my work has continuously leaned towards the portrayal of urban environments. I have always found myself attracted to the aesthetic of more urbanized places. These places hold a history and portray the livelihoods of the people that have occupied them, almost, themselves, becoming living things with the ability to have character and change this character over time.
Keeping this in mind, the work that I have currently been working on is somewhat of a photographic memorial of my childhood. Of all the ways that I connect to my childhood, the most intense has been through the location where most of this time was spent. Being that I strongly believe that it is the experiences in one’s life which makes them who they are and as a visual person, the place and therefore the aesthetic where I grew up has been very important to me. Thus in my current work I am attempting to visually show my appreciation of this place. It is a place that is considered to be of little importance, ordinary, and even blue collar. Yet, to me, this place is romantic and layered with memories.
Through the lighting, layering, and texture of this work I am reaching out to others in hope to engage and bring them into a world that they would otherwise pass by. My hope is for the viewer to grasp a romantic and almost magical quality from the work, coupled with a sense of loss and stillness that the passing of time can often provide
Friday, March 28, 2008
Bio
Thus far, my artistic career has been a montage of visual experiments consisting various different mediums and subject matters. Yet, my strongest and best explored medium, which I have spent the majority of my schooling building upon, has been photography. Within this medium my work has continuously leaned towards the portrayal of urban environments. I have always found myself attracted to the aesthetic of more urbanized places. These places hold a history and portray the livelihoods of the people that have occupied them, almost, themselves, becoming living things with the ability to have character and change this character over time.
Keeping this in mind, the work that I have currently been working on is somewhat of a photographic memorial of my childhood. Of all the ways that I connect to my childhood, the most intense has been through the location where most of this time was spent. Being that I strongly believe that it is the experiences in one’s life which makes them who they are and as a visual person, the place and therefore the aesthetic where I grew up has been very important to me. Thus in my current work I am attempting to visually show my appreciation of this place. It is a place that is considered to be of little importance, ordinary, and even blue collar. Yet, to me, this place is romantic and layered with memories.
Through the lighting, layering, and texture of this work I am reaching out to others in hope to engage and bring them into a world that they would otherwise pass by. My hope is for the viewer to grasp a romantic and almost magical quality from the work, coupled with a sense of loss and stillness that the passing of time can often provide.
Alan Berliner
I also thought it was amazing that he spent two whole decades of information and footage to make this film. It really shows his dedication to his artwork and his family. This dedication defiately showed in the film. The whole movie was so dynamic. The way that he drew information out of his father and drew his father's pesonality out, really made the movie.
I think the most interesting thing that was said in the film was "The one thing we (they) all share is the thing they know nothing about." (their ancesters and jewish culture)
Sunday, March 23, 2008
upland....
Geography
Upland is located at 
(39.856762, -75.379429)[1].
According to the United States Census Bureau, the borough has a total area of 0.7 square miles (1.7 km²), all of it land.
Demographics
As of the census[2] of 2000, there were 2,977 people, 1,116 households, and 765 families residing in the borough. The population density was 4,439.0 people per square mile (1,715.6/km²). There were 1,216 housing units at an average density of 1,813.2/sq mi (700.7/km²). The racial makeup of the borough was 77.23% White, 19.68% African American, 0.30% Native American, 0.34% Asian, 0.81% from other races, and 1.65% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 2.08% of the population.
There were 1,116 households out of which 33.3% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 42.7% were married couples living together, 20.4% had a female householder with no husband present, and 31.4% were non-families. 26.7% of all households were made up of individuals and 12.3% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.67 and the average family size was 3.28.
In the borough the population was spread out with 28.7% under the age of 18, 8.3% from 18 to 24, 27.9% from 25 to 44, 20.2% from 45 to 64, and 14.9% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 35 years. For every 100 females there were 89.0 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 84.3 males.
The median income for a household in the borough was $28,869, and the median income for a family was $35,640. Males had a median income of $31,188 versus $26,723 for females. The per capita income for the borough was $15,391. About 20.1% of families and 25.1% of the population were below the poverty line, including 46.3% of those under age 18 and 6.9% of those age 65 or over.
Saturday, March 22, 2008
Thoughts....
Urban Landscape Photography Tips
Last week I was reading an issue of Digital Photographer Magazine (issue 50) which had a good feature on Urban Landscapes.
In it they interviewed an urban landscape photographer (Mark Bury) and asked him for his top 5 tips on his craft. I thought I’d share them here.
The headings are his the descriptions are my paraphrases of his tips combined with some of my own thoughts.:
1. Early Bird Catches the Worm - First thing in the morning is one of Mark’s favorite times to shoot for a number of reasons including that the light is diffused and the ’sky acts like a giant filter’. I’ve done a little urban photography too and also find that early morning shots can be great for a two other reasons too:
- Clean Streets - Most street cleaning happens over night and the early morning often finds urban scenes with less litter to clutter your shots.
- People Free Shots - Shots around dawn have less likelihood of being cluttered by people. It’s amazing who lonely a city can look if you’re able to get a people free shot.
- Different Activity - Of course you might want people in some of your shots - It’s amazing how an urban area can change depending upon who is around. While at 9 am you’ll get a peak hour feel to your shots and on the weekend at midday you might get a crowd of shoppers - in the wee hours of the morning there’s a whole different group of people wandering the streets can give your shots a whole new focal point.
2. Prospective Perspectives - Mark suggests that the shape of the buildings that you’re shooting should alter the way you frame your images. Buildings with domes should include background to help viewers appreciate it’s form and square buildings look best when shot at a 45-60 degree angle in Mark’s books.
3. Up and Coming - Don’t just photograph the finished product when it comes to buildings but also focus upon construction areas and what is being built and/or renovated.
4. Permission to Shoot - Some places don’t allow public photography and you might need to get a license and/or other form of permission to photograph them. Mark likens it to getting a model release when photographing people. Getting permission can mean the difference between owning copyright or not of the images you take in some instances. This will of course vary from place to place.
5. Angle Attack - Find new angles to photographing well known buildings. Find areas of them that are hidden from the average photographer and look for interesting patterns, shapes, textures, reflections and angles that highlight the details of the building that might have previously been missed by others.
Read our previous tutorial on photographing urban landscapes and submit your urban landscape shots to the Urban Decay Assignment in our fourms where the above photo was submitted by wbrag17 from Photos by Will.
Monday, March 17, 2008
Thursday, March 6, 2008
"killer" "sister" "mother" "friend" "lover" "co-worker" etc.
Todd Hido
Sunday, March 2, 2008
Direction
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
Friday, February 8, 2008
Anthony Goicolea
Visually, the many points of views in his images really makes his images that much more interesting. His combinations of landscapes and people really creates a great tension in his work, forcing your eye to wonder and stay interested.
I also really liked how in his detention series he made everyone identical and therefore there was no difference between the victim and victimizer. This has really influenced how i think i want my work to be.
| By Megan Lane and Tomiko Newson BBC News |
Kirsten Maile is bright, attractive and eloquent. She wants to study to be an underwater diving photographer. She is also on probation for ABH - actual bodily harm - after she rammed a bottle into a girl's face.
Nor is it the first time that she has lashed out while drunk. She has twice been charged with common assault, and claims to have "wrapped a girl's ponytail around my hand and smashed her face against a basin".
"It doesn't seem that big a deal to me. You see it on the TV, on the streets, loads of fights. Every time I have ever hit someone, I've been drunk. It's easier to lash out, harder to hold on." 
She knows that it may just be a matter of time before she loses her rag again. And if she gets caught, she'll go to prison.
Dr Jon Cole, of Liverpool University's School of Psychology, says that while alcohol doesn't make people more aggressive, it stops us making sensible choices: "You make the easiest choice, which is often aggression."
In a survey for BBC Three's Bashing Booze Birds, almost one in 10 people aged 18 to 34 say they have been physically attacked by a drunk woman. And 41% say they have seen a woman who appears to be drunk attack someone else. 
Kirsten knows alcohol triggers her short fuse, but believes there are other factors.
"I grew up watching people around me using alcohol as an escape route. There was aggression in the house; my father and his girlfriend physically fighting, constantly arguing. Me and my father, me and my mother arguing down the phone. One big argument."
Kirsten has now sought help for her problems with alcohol and aggression.
A new study and survey done by GameDaily.com says that 60% of parents ban their daughters from playing games at a hardcore level whereas only 37% ban their sons. The study suggests that the social norm is that women should not be associated with activities that are violent like hunting and sports. The idea is that video games are synonymously known as being violent. This is because the top games in America are games that are not marketed towards girls. They key demographic is still 18-24 year old males.
Funny Fact
It has been conjectured that perhaps when women kill their husbands they feel justified in doing so and therefore feel less guilty than their male counterparts.
Who had a little curl,
Right in the middle of her forehead,
And when she was good,
She was very, very good,
But when she was bad, she was horrid. By: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
This was quoted in a book I am reading (Women and Violence), the following paragraph says:
This rhyme which is found in many children's books, and which is recited to little children, reflects the expected behavior of females in our society. Little girls and also women need to be sweet, cherubic, and good. when they deviate from these role expectations, they are considered to be very, very bad, even horrid. It is true that females are highly under-represented in crime in the United States. Perhaps as a result of the fact that female criminals are in the minority or perhaps because women are not considered the important people in our society, there has been very little written about the female offender. In 1968 it was suggested that one chapter would be all that was needed to present the available information on the nature and origins of female criminality.
Saturday, February 2, 2008
Hum...
Hum..... so many of the images that I find concerning women and aggression have sexual undertones..... Hum.....
someone else with opinion like mine
Aggressive Women
This has happened so many times:
I am in a meeting at which a woman scientist is discussed (for whatever reason), and she is criticized for being "aggressive".
I object.
My colleagues think I am biased and possibly irrational, and that my response is some knee-jerk reflex to Defend Scientific Womanhood no matter what.
My opinions about everything else are not taken very seriously because I have demonstrated that I am not objective.
Criticizing someone for being aggressive is a cheap way to undermine them. What does it even mean? Is being aggressive always bad? If someone is so aggressively competitive that they will step on everyone in their path, including students and puppies, and cast aside all consideration of ethics to achieve scientific glory, then OK, I think that is a bad thing. However, that is very far from the case in every example in my personal experience, including the most recent one.
This insidious phenomenon has been discussed before by me and many others: women who demonstrate self-confidence and comprehensive knowledge of their research/science are seen (by some) as aggressive. I should mention that it is not just men who criticize women for this; women also criticize other women for being aggressive, and no, I am not misinterpreting something that was meant as a compliment.
The recent example that has me so angry today involves a case in which an extremely smart, friendly, personable, and interesting woman was severely criticized for being aggressive. I was so surprised at this absurd statement that I laughed out loud. I asked for clarification, thinking at first that the comment wasn't meant to be as critical as it sounded or perhaps that I had missed some important information somewhere, but no such luck. I think my response was calm, reasoned, yet forceful -- perhaps even aggressive! -- but, whether I was effective or not (clearly I was not), why was I the only one objecting?
And another thing, since I am ranting:
In this meeting, a woman was described as glib, and this was again meant as a criticism. I said to the maker of the glib-comment: I would describe her as very articulate and well-spoken about a wide range of topics, showing great depth and breadth. Where do you draw the line between glib and articulate? My colleague said OK, you're right, she is very articulate. I said And that's a good thing, right? Yes, we all agreed that being articulate is a good thing. Maybe I won that point, but I didn't change whatever underlying reason made that colleague describe someone as glib rather than articulate in the first place.
I hate it when I underestimate the insanity of my colleagues. I am quite cynical, but I think I need to recalibrate my cynicism for some of this committee work.
This semester, I am on more committees than is good for my sanity. I still like to think that it is important that I am there to make people defend their stupid sexist statements, however ineffective I am at changing their opinions, but perhaps I just think that because the alternative is difficult to accept.
Response
Readings
It also states that Darwin recognized that the major function of emotions for animals and humans is one of communication....(like, approach me or stay the fuck away from me communication). To continue... It is being said that the connection between anger and inflicting harm is not automatic. Also, Most of the situations that make adult humans angry do so as a result of previous experience. While the biological patterning of anger can be observed in human infants, the capacity of particular stimuli and situations to evoke anger in humans is usually learned.
Konrad Lorenz, a pioneer in the study of ethology and a Nobel Prize winner, defined aggression as the fighting instinct in the beast and man. He conceived of aggression in terms of a biologically based, instinctual system that derives energy from organismic processes independently of external stimuli or provocation. The aggressive energy builds up, as it were, until discharged by an appropriate releaser. In the absence of an appropriate releaser, the aggressive energy will eventually be discharged spontaneously or in response to an inappropriate stimulus.
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
for own use...
What about girls? Are they really not aggressive?
Nina S. Mounts, Ph.D., The
Human Development and Family Life Bulletin
A Review of Research and Practice
Volume 3, Issue 2, Summer 1997
Many of the books or papers on aggression in children focus primarily on boys. Most people assume that boys are more aggressive than girls, which leads to problems for boys, but not for girls, in their peer relationships. In fact, many of the research studies that examine aggressive children only include boys.
A MORE SUBTLE AGGRESSION
In her recent work, Dr. Nikki Crick of the
Most of the previous research, as well as interventions with aggressive, peer-rejected children, define aggression as either physical or verbal behavior intended to hurt another person. Crick believes that girls, in general, do not engage in this type of aggression against their peers. They do, however, employ relational aggression. Relational aggression is behavior specifically intended to hurt another child's friendships or feelings of inclusion in a peer group. An example of relational aggression would be a child spreading hurtful rumors about another child so that other children are less inclined to be friendly toward her. Or, a child might retaliate against another child by not including her in the play group. Relational aggression, then, is deliberate manipulation on the part of a child to damage another child's peer relationships.
Crick's work with elementary school children has demonstrated that the degree of aggressiveness exhibited by girls has been underestimated, mainly because it is difficult to measure. Clearly, when one child hits another, that child is behaving in an overtly aggressive way. In contrast, how do you tell when one child has started a rumor about another?
Because adults are not always privy to the comings and goings of children's peer groups, they may be unaware of any relational aggression. Although Crick detected overlap in teachers and children's reports of relational aggression in the classrooms where she conducted her research, she did not detect complete overlap. In other words, relational aggression occurred without the knowledge of the teacher.
LINKS TO PEER REJECTION
Using measures completed both by teachers and children, Crick found that girls engaged in higher levels of relational aggression than boys. Girls who engaged in relational aggression exhibited a number of adjustment difficulties, and had self-reported higher levels of depression, loneliness, and social isolation than their peers. In addition, peers disliked relationally aggressive girls more than other girls.
Girls who engaged in relational aggression early in the school year were more likely to be rejected by their peers later in the school year than girls who did not engage in relational aggression early on. Not surprisingly, children who demonstrated relational aggression at one time point were likely to continue using it throughout the school year.
Because research finds relational aggression to be a relatively stable behavior in children, Crick's research has implications for practitioners who conduct interventions with peer-rejected children. Clearly, children who engage in relational aggression are candidates for peer relationship intervention programs to prevent future peer rejection.
FRIENDSHIP CHARACTERISTICS
Previous research on children's peer relationships has shown that having at least one friend buffers a child from some of the negative effects of peer rejection. Because relational aggression involves manipulating friendships, Crick and Grotpeter (1995) were interested in examining the friendships of relationally aggressive children. Friendships of relationally aggressive children did not differ from those of nonaggressive children on measures of caring, companionship, and helping one another. Relationally aggressive children's friendships did differ from nonrelationally aggressive children in several ways, however. First, relationally aggressive children and their best friends reported higher levels of intimacy in their friendships than did other children. This high level of intimacy probably puts the nonaggressive friend at risk because the relationally aggressive child has ready access to important, private information about the other child. A relationally aggressive child could easily use threats to disclose the information to manipulate her friend. Second, a high level of exclusivity exists in the friendship with the relationally aggressive child. Again, this may put the other friend at risk to be manipulated because she may have limited friends to turn to as alternatives. A final feature of these friendships is their high degree of internal relational aggression. Relationally aggressive children direct many of their aggressive behaviors toward their friends. These findings are dramatically different from those of overtly aggressive children and their friends. Overtly aggressive children tend to behave aggressively toward those external to the friendship rather than toward each other. The aggressive behavior is directed outside the dyad.
This line of research clearly will be of interest to practitioners as it develops. Although no interventions have been developed to date using this information, practitioners should develop prevention interventions with relationally aggressive children.
Female Perpetrators
As recently as 10 years ago, it was a common assumption that females did not or could not sexually abuse children or youth. Even some professionals working in the field believed that women represented only about 1% to 3% of sexual abusers at most. However, mounting research evidence about sexual abuse perpetration at the hands of teen and adult females has begun to challenge our assumptions, though these earlier and dated views still tend to predominate.
The percentage of women and teenage girl perpetrators recorded in case report studies is small and ranges from 3% to 10% (Kendall-Tackett and Simon, 1987; McCarty, 1986; Schultz and Jones, 1983; Wasserman and Kappel, 1985). When the victim is male, female perpetrators account for 1 % to 24% of abusers. When the victim is female, female perpetrators account for 6% to 17% of abusers (American Humane Association, 1981; Finkelhor and Russell, 1984; Finkelhor et al., 1990). In the Ontario Incidence Study, 10% of sexual abuse investigations involved female perpetrators (Trocme, 1994). However, in six studies reviewed by Russell and Finkelhor, female perpetrators accounted for 25% or more of abusers. Ramsay-Klawsnik (1990) found that adult females were abusers of males 37% of the time and female adolescents 19% of the time. Both of these rates are higher than the same study reported for adult and teen male abusers.
Dynamics of Female-Perpetrated Abuse
Some research has reported that female perpetrators commit fewer and less intrusive acts of sexual abuse compared to males. While male perpetrators are more likely to engage in anal intercourse and to have the victim engage in oral-genital contact, females tend to use more foreign objects as part of the abusive act (Kaufman et al., 1995). This study also reported that differences were not found in the- frequency of vaginal intercourse, fondling by the victim or abuser, genital body contact without penetration or oral contact by the abuser.
Females may be more likely to use verbal coercion than physical force. The most commonly reported types of abuse by female perpetrators include vaginal intercourse, oral sex, fondling and group sex (Faller, 1987; Hunter et al., 1993). However, women also engage in mutual masturbation, oral, anal and genital sex acts, show children pornography and play sex games (Johnson, 1989; Knopp and Lackey, 1987). The research suggests that, overall, female and male perpetrators commit many of the same acts and follow many of the same patterns of abuse against their victims. They also do not tend to differ significantly in terms of their relationship to the victim (most are relatives) or the location of the abuse (Allen, 1990; Kaufman et al., 1995).
It is interesting to note in the study by Kaufman et al. (1995) that 8% of the female perpetrators were teachers and 23% were babysitters, compared to male perpetrators who were 0% and 8% respectively. Finkelhor et al. (1988) also report significantly higher rates of sexual abuse of children by females in day-care settings. Of course, Finkelhor's findings should not surprise us given that women represent the majority of day-care employees.
Research on teen and adult female sexual abuse perpetrators has found that many suffer from low self-esteem, antisocial behaviour, poor social and anger management skills, fear of rejection, passivity, promiscuity, mental health problems, post-traumatic stress disorder and mood disorders (Hunter et al., 1993; Mathews, Matthews and Speltz, 1989). However, as in the case of male perpetrators, research does not substantiate that highly emotionally disturbed or psychotic individuals predominate among the larger population of female sexual abusers (Faller, 1987).
There is some evidence that females are more likely to be involved with co-abusers, typically a male, though studies report a range from 25% to 77% (Faller, 1987; Kaufman et al., 1995; McCarty, 1986). However, Mayer (1992), in a review of data on 17 adolescent female sex offenders, found that only 2 were involved with male co-perpetrators. She also found that the young women in this study knew their victims and that none experienced legal consequences for their actions.
Self-report studies provide a very different view of sexual abuse perpetration and substantially increase the number of female perpetrators. In a retrospective study of male victims, 60% reported being abused by females (Johnson and Shrier, 1987). The same rate was found in a sample of college students (Fritz et al., l 981). In other studies of male university and college students, rates of female perpetration were found at levels as high as 72% to 82% (Fromuth and Burkhart, 1987, 1989; Seidner and Calhoun, 1984). Bell et al. (1981) found that 27% of males were abused by females. In some of these types of studies, females represent as much as 50% of sexual abusers (Risin and Koss, 1987). Knopp and Lackey (1987) found that 51% of victims of female sexual abusers were male. It is evident that case report and self-report studies yield very different types of data about prevalence. These extraordinary differences tell us we need to start questioning all of our assumptions about perpetrators and victims of child maltreatment.
Finally, there is an alarmingly high rate of sexual abuse by females in the backgrounds of rapists, sex offenders and sexually aggressive men - 59% (Petrovich and Templer, 1984), 66% (Groth, 1979) and 80% (Briere and Smiljanich, 1993). A strong case for the need to identify female perpetrators can be found in Table 4, which presents the findings from a study of adolescent sex offenders by O'Brien (1989). Male adolescent sex offenders abused by "females only" chose female victims almost exclusively.
article about women as sexual aggressors of interest
Women's sexual aggression against men: prevalence and predictors
Sexual aggression researchers have been concerned almost exclusively with men's use of coercive strategies against women (Frieze, 2000). This focus reflects the reality that men are responsible for the vast majority of sexual assaults. An additional reason lies in the fact that legal definitions of rape and sexual assault were restricted for a long time to male perpetrators and female victims. Thus, from a legal point of view, sexual aggression was by definition an assault by a man on a woman. Changes in the law in favor of gender-neutral descriptions of victims and perpetrators were slow to be implemented and are still not ubiquitous (Allgeier & Lamping, 1998). In Germany, the penal code was changed in 1997 to remove the restriction of sexual victimization to female victims of extramarital sexual assault and allow both women and men to be acknowledged as victims of sexual violence, both within and outside marital relationships.
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Apart from these reasons specific to sexual aggression, the relative neglect of women's use of sexual aggression reflects a general tendency in psychological research to focus on aggressive behavior as a male phenomenon (Krahe, 2001). This, in turn, is due to the preoccupation with physical aggression, which seems, indeed, to be more widespread among men than among women (Eagly & Steffen, 1986; Hyde, 1984). However, if other forms of aggressive behavior are considered, such as verbal aggression, indirect aggression (e.g., spreading rumors), or relational aggression (e.g., exclusion), it becomes clear that girls and women engage in these forms of behavior to a substantial degree (e.g., Bjorkvist, Osterman, & Lagerspetz, 1994; Crick & Grotpeter, 1995). Moreover, gender differences in aggression were shown to disappear in laboratory settings or even to be reversed if normative constraints against aggression were weakened, for example, through de-individuation or prior frustration (Bettencourt & Miller, 1996; Lightdale & Prentice, 1994).
Since the late 1980s, the prevalence, antecedents, and consequences of women's sexual aggression against men have been explored in a small number of studies (cf. Anderson & Struckman-Johnson, 1998, for the most comprehensive collection of papers so far). The present study was designed to contribute to this emerging database by exploring the prevalence of women's sexual aggression among adolescents and young adults in Germany. In an attempt to overcome the restriction of previous research to samples of college students (cf. Spitzberg, 1999), participants were recruited from diverse educational backgrounds. Furthermore, we sought to provide evidence for potential predictors of sexual aggression. As Frieze (2000) noted, cultural norms are likely to play an important part in explaining gender differences or similarities with regard to aggressive behavior. Because the majority of available data come from the United States, an exploration of women's sexual aggression in other cultural contexts is an important addition to the literature. By analyzing the prevalence and predictors of women's sexual aggression in a sample of German women and relating the findings to previous U.S. evidence, our research may help to establish the generalizability of the evidence on women's sexual aggression across different countries.
For the purposes of the present investigation, sexual aggression is defined as any form of behavior directed toward the goal of making another person engage in sexual contact with the actor against the target person's will. This definition accommodates different aggressive strategies, such as verbal pressure or physical threat, as well as different forms of sexual contact. The term "sexual violence" is reserved for those forms of sexual aggression that involve the threat or use of physical force.
In an early study of sexual victimization of men by women, Sarrel and Masters (1982) presented 11 cases that documented that men may be made to show sexual responses (i.e., erections, ejaculations) against their will. Indeed, such sexual reactions can be triggered not only by sexual stimulation but also by intense feelings of fear or anger. Thus, against commonsense wisdom, there is evidence that it is possible to coerce an unwilling man into sexual activity in general and into penile-vaginal intercourse in particular.
Studies differ in terms of their focus on the prevalence versus incidence of women's sexual aggression. In prevalence studies, researchers ask if a woman has ever shown (a particular form of) sexual aggression toward a man (e.g., Hogben, Byrne, & Hamburger, 1996). In contrast, in incidence studies researchers ask for sexual aggression that occurred during a specified period of time, usually the last 12 months prior to the survey (e.g., Larimer, Lydum, Anderson, & Turner, 1999).
Concerning the prevalence of women's sexual aggression, the available literature shows wide variations in the number of women who report sexually aggressive behavior (cf. Byers & O'Sullivan, 1998, for a review). These variations are due, in large part, to differences in the way in which sexual aggression has been defined and measured. Some researchers restricted their questions to sexual aggression toward dating partners (e.g., Struckman-Johnson, 1988), whereas others included male targets beyond dating relationships (e.g., Anderson, 1996). Some asked for sexual aggression toward a male partner (Shea, 1998), others did not refer explicitly to the target person's gender (Larimer et al., 1999; O'Sullivan, Byers, & Finkelman, 1998). Overall prevalence rates reported in different studies are also difficult to compare because they reflect different levels of inclusiveness. For example, some studies include the misuse of authority or the administration of alcohol, whereas others are restricted to physical aggression. Therefore, the following summary of pertinent evidence on women's sexual aggression against male targets is meant to delineate the boundaries of the problem rather than to provide a solid picture of the extent to which women behave in a sexually aggressive manner toward men.
