Sex Differences in the Perception of Rape Victims

The present study investigated the effects of victim characteristics on people's perceptions of a rape incident. Subjects read an account of a rape incident in which the victim was described either as a virgin or as a sexually promiscuous woman. It was predicted that, because of the different attributional perspectives adopted by males and females when explaining a rape incident, the characteristics of the victim would influence the judgments of male subjects but not of female subjects. The results obtained supported this prediction.