Sexual Choking at University Students’ Most Recent Sexual Event: Consent, Wantedness, and Choking-Related Symptoms

Introduction Sexual choking is a form of neck compression that has become prevalent among young adults in the United States and internationally. We aimed to examine sexual choking in relation to event-level consent and consent cues, wantedness, safe words, safe gestures, and bodily responses to being choked. Method The analytic sample was comprised of 3780 randomly sampled students (1839 women, 1858 men, 84 transgender and gender nonbinary students) who completed a cross-sectional, confidential online survey in 2021 at a large public U.S. Midwestern university. Results We found that 18.3% of participants had been choked by a partner and 16.0% had choked a partner at their most recent sexual event. Most participants (92.7%) reported that being choked had been consensual and 69.0% had wanted to be choked “very much”; however, 50.2% of participants had not agreed upon safe words or gestures before initiating sex. More than one-third (38.1%) of those who had been choked reported using body language with no verbal communication to indicate consent. We also found that 7.2% of those choked at their most recent event reported alterations in consciousness. Conclusions Sexual choking is prevalent and consequential to health. Although it is usually described as consensual, many students rely on nonverbal consent cues. Social-Policy Implications Findings have important implications for sexuality education and violence prevention programming on college campuses as well as in communities. Also, healthcare providers should consider providing anticipatory guidance about choking to adolescents and young adults, given the health risks associated with being “choked” during sex.