The transition between high school and college can be a time of new identity for young women. It is a time to shed the identity they had in high school and reinvent themselves for a new experience in college.

One behavior that young women entering college can alter easily is her alcohol consumption. The year of transition into college can be a time when alcohol consumption behavior changes and that change may impact other parts of life.

A recent study looked at the impact of changing drinking behaviors on the victimization of women in the transition between high school and college. Parks, Romosz, Bradizza and Hsieh were interested in how the risk for victimization was affected based on a young woman’s change in drinking status between high school and college.

The study employed a Web-based survey each fall for the first two years of college. There were 886 participants, all attending the same large state university in New York.

Using the survey, the women answered questions about alcohol and drug consumption, psychological factors, number of sexual partners and experiences with physical and sexual victimization the year before entering college. This information was gathered the first year that the survey was completed by the participants.

The participants took the survey again during their second year of college, applying the questions to the past year.

The results of the study indicated that young women who abstained from drinking alcohol were significantly less likely to be victimized physically or sexually during their first year of college when compared with drinkers.

Logistic regression analysis was used to determine that there were differences in the predictors of victimization during the first year of college, including a history of victimization, psychological symptoms and number of sexual partners. The type of change in drinking over the transition also was a predictor.

The results of the study provide important information for those educating young women transitioning into college. When compared with abstainers, being a new drinker combined with factors such as having a history of physical victimization and greater psychological symptoms increased the odds of physical victimization.

Factors such as having more psychological symptoms, sexual partners, and increasing weekly drinking increased the risk of sexual victimization during the first year of college.

The information found in this study will be very helpful to those planning prevention efforts for young women entering college. Understanding risk factors may help young women make informed decisions about alcohol consumption as they begin their college years.