U Got This! was developed through a collaboration between Catharsis Productions and Jellyvision, a Chicago-based interactive software company that designed the successful computer gameshow, You Don’t Know Jack. By integrating Jellyvision’s patented “Interactive Conversation” software with Catharsis’ subject matter expertise, U Got This! delivers a uniquely engaging online experience for users. Catharsis Productions is known for innovative, relatable, and research-supported live sexual violence prevention programs, including Sex Signals, The Hook-Up, and Beat the Blame Game. We use humor and interactive dialogue in strategic ways to build connections with our audiences, but to also challenge victim blaming attitudes and misconceptions regarding sexual violence. Since 2000, Catharsis Productions has delivered over 14,000 live sexual violence prevention programs to university and military audiences around the world. U Got This! was developed in response to clients’ needs to 1.) reach more students than those that are able to attend a live program, and 2.) provide supplemental primary prevention education to their populations in order to improve campus awareness and culture. Initially developed and piloted in 2014-2015, U Got This! was utilized by several colleges as part of their prevention efforts beginning in Fall 2016. |
The social-ecological model employed in the design of all of our interpersonal violence prevention programs is a public health model for reducing community violence (Dahlberg et al 2002, Fielding, Teutsch, Breslow 2010). Addressing the issue of sexual violence from four levels of social influence, the individual, interpersonal, group/community and systems/societal levels is essential for creating sustainable cultural change (Dahlberg et al 2002, Fielding, Teutsch, Breslow 2010). Our programs can work as stand-alone programs, but are most effective when bundled together to ensure a university message alignment of research-supported primary prevention best practices. They are designed to be both additive and mutually reinforcing. This same philosophy informs the structure of U Got This! The information must be logically scaffolded, from building general awareness, to more specific content, to intervention strategies. If the intervention strategies are presented without moral framework or context, they will ring hollow to students. Because many students argue that they know that sexual assault and domestic violence are wrong, they see little value in how education on these issues is pertinent to them. Policies and definitions are also meaningless if communities don’t understand why they exist and why they should actively support them. Again, the program is structured to foster real engagement with the subject matter in engaging ways. The first module of U Got This!, entitled, U Against the World, explores how toxic cultural messages embedded in entertainment, media, and everyday life, all contribute to making a community that may tacitly accept interpersonal violence. Module 2: U Gotta Know When It’s Wrong, dives into a deeper exploration of the many ways in which interpersonal violence may manifest. The scenarios include stalking, domestic violence, and sexual violence, and are inclusive of racial, ethnic, gender and sexual orientation identities and relationship dynamics. Module 3: U Gotta Be an Upstander, highlights a range of proven tactics an individual might employ to confidently intervene to support a vulnerable person. By the end of the training, users are inspired intellectually and emotionally to take a more proactive stand against interpersonal violence not only in the moment, but with the objective of galvanizing a positive culture change within their community. |
This program incorporates theory and research from multiple disciplines. This theoretical framework is divided into: • Content o Content related to the nature of sexual violence and perpetrators is driven by the research of serial non-stranger rapists conducted by Lisak (2002); and McWhorter (2009); research on the role of justification, victim blaming, and sexist attitudes on perpetration conducted by Wegner, Abbey, et al., (2015); Gavey, (2005); and Kline, (2015). o Content related to role of coercion and consent is driven by the research of Conroy, et al., (2014), Young, et al., (2016); Degue and DeLillo (2004). o Content related to the role of schema and script theory is driven by the research of Littleton, (2006), Abbey, 2002; Frith & Kitzinger, 2001; Kowalski, 1993; Muehlenhard et al., 1996 • Approach o Our pedagogical approach is based in part on best practices research conducted by Lonsway, (1996; 2009) and Schewe, 2002; bystander intervention research conducted by Berkowitz and Banyard (2007); and moral domain theory research conducted by Turiel, (1983; 2008) and Nucci (1997; 2001). o Our strategic use of humor is based on the research of Chesebro and McCroskey, (1998); Doskoch, (1996); Eisner, (1998); Farelly and Lynch, (1987); and Kher, Molstad, and Donahue, (1999); Madsen, (1993); Martin, (2007); Meyer, (2000); Nussbaum, (1992); and, O’Quin and Aronoff, (1981). • Dosage: the research supporting three independent blocks of instruction, spaced days apart, comes from the work of Ebbinghaus, (1885); and Loftus, (1985). |
Statistics and trauma-related data were pulled from most highly credible resources, (e.g., RAINN, CDC, etc.) In addition, as content has been developed for the training, we have consistently engaged with special stakeholders, in particular, survivors, advocates, counselors, members of marginalized communities, to ensure language is appropriate and supportive to survivors. We also heed the feedback we receive from university clients on an annual basis when considering changes to the content. |
