Developing a Narrative-Oriented Game-Based Sexual Assault Intervention for High School Youth

Background: Bystander intervention offers a promising approach to decreasing sexual violence among young people. Digital games have many advantages as a method for promoting bystander interventions among high school students. Not only are games familiar, motivating, and engaging to this population, they have also successfully fostered change across a variety of health attitudes and behaviors.

Objective: To describe the development of Bystander, a digital game for high school students about sexual violence intervention.

Methods: The game Bystander was designed in a university-based game design lab. Bystander tells the story of three high school students and is supported by mini-games through which the player learns about and practices distinct bystander behaviors (e.g., direct intervention, post-assault survivor support, and seeking proactive advocacy opportunities). Fifty youth ages 14-18 were recruited to play, provide feedback, and pretest the game for its acceptability, relatability, and it effect on rape myth acceptance and attitudes towards bystander behaviors.

Results: Participants provided critical feedback on Bystander’s content and aesthetics. Findings from these data were iteratively incorporated into the design and development of the game. Effects on rape myth acceptance and attitudes towards bystander intervention from pre to post-game assessment will be discussed.

Discussion: Bystander may be an accessible and engaging tool for promoting sexual violence bystander intervention, appropriate and scalable for use in a variety of educational settings. Future research should investigate the benefits, drawbacks, and efficacy of narrative digital games compared to that of traditional in-person interventions for sexual violence bystander interventions.