Understanding Gender Differences in Rape Victim Blaming: The Power of Social Influence and Just World Beliefs

Abstract

Victims of sexual violence are frequently blamed by friends, family, or legal personnel in the aftermath of an attack, with men attributing greater blame on average than women. Victims’ experiences of being blamed may generate a vicious cycle in which they are more likely to be blamed in the future. Moreover, just world beliefs (JWB) have been studied extensively as an underlying cognitive mechanism that predicts greater blame. Studies examining the influence of social support on blame have yet to examine the unique role of JWB on these attributions. The current study examined blame attribution of a fictional rape victim who received either positive, negative, or neutral support from friends and family in a sample of 383 undergraduate men and women. Individually, social support and JWB were both significant predictors of blame, and women were more influenced by social support than men; specifically, gender was a more salient predictor of blame toward the positively supported victim, suggesting that positive support received by friends and family may evoke a domino effect of support from other women. Conditional effects revealed that JWB were most influential on blame when responding to the positively supported victim. Implications and suggestions for future research are discussed.

Keywords

sexual assault social support social influence just world beliefs victim blame

Introduction

Rape victims are at an increased risk for a host of negative psychological outcomes, including posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD; Kessler, Sonnega, Bromet, Hughes, & Nelson, 1995) and an increased likelihood of being revictimized (Marx, Calhoun, Wilson, & Meyerson, 2001). Moreover, victims are often met with negative responses from others, including victim blaming, which may, in turn, exacerbate PTSD symptomatology, self-blame, and use of maladaptive coping strategies (Ullman, 2010; Ullman, Townsend, Filipas, & Starzynski, 2007). Whereas positive reactions from friends, family, and formal support providers (e.g., police, medical personnel, mental health professionals) do little to buffer against negative outcomes (Ullman, 2010), negative reactions appear to be very strongly related to lack of recovery (Campbell, Ahrens, Sefl, Wasco, & Barnes, 2001) and PTSD symptoms (Ullman et al., 2007).

Gender and Victim Blame

Research seeking to understand the roots of victim blaming has examined a variety of victim- and observer-specific characteristics (for a review, see van der Bruggen & Grubb, 2014). Several studies have found that observer gender significantly influences perceptions of rape victims, including attributions of blame or responsibility, favorable or unfavorable attitudes about victims, and whether an assault is labeled as such. Although some studies report that women are more likely to blame female victims than men (Cameron & Stritzke, 2003), or that there is no gender difference in victim blaming sentiments (Cassidy & Hurell, 1995; Yarmey, 1985), the majority of research suggests that men tend to blame and have less favorable attitudes toward female rape victims compared to women (e.g., Black & Gold, 2008; Grubb & Harrower, 2008; Kleinke & Meyer, 1990; Workman & Freeburg, 1999). Many theories for this gender difference have been examined in the literature, though the current study will examine the moderation effects of social support and just world beliefs (JWB) on the relationship between gender and victim blame. Men and women appear to be uniquely affected by social support and JWB, suggesting that these external and internal factors may differentially motivate the tendency to blame for either gender.

Victim Blaming and Social Support

In addition to observer gender, perceived social support may also play a role in victim blaming. In the absence of adequate contextual information, individuals may turn to others to help form conclusions. Through a process known as spontaneous trait inference, individuals readily infer dispositional traits based on minimal information; this process is done spontaneously, unintentionally, and without effort (Rim, Uleman, & Trope, 2009). Impressions of an individual can even be formed simply based on another person’s description of that individual (Carlston & Skowronski, 2005). Thus, if an individual learns of a victim’s assault from someone who is engaging in victim blaming, that individual may be primed to blame the victim as well. Likewise, individuals are powerfully motivated by social influence and conformity. People habitually gather information on the attitudes and behaviors of others to inform themselves of which behaviors and beliefs are appropriate in any given situation (Cialdini, 2001; Cialdini & Trost, 1998). Due to these mechanisms of social influence, an individual who has not previously formed attributions of blame or responsibility following another’s rape—perhaps due to, for example, a lack of descriptive or contextual information—may instead form opinions based on the reactions of others.

To date, two studies have examined the influence of positive and negative reactions from victims’ loved ones on observer attributions of blame toward rape victims (Anderson & Lyons, 2005; Brown & Testa, 2008). Both studies used vignettes in which the social support provided to the victim was manipulated, with positive support defined by supporting, listening to, and believing the victim, and negative support defined by blaming, avoiding, and accusing the victim of overreacting. Anderson and Lyons (2005) found that victim blame was significantly predicted by social support, such that greater blame was attributed to the unsupported, or negatively supported, victim and less blame was attributed to the supported, or positively supported, victim. This effect appeared to be even more robust for male participants, perhaps due to the fact that men generally attribute more responsibility to and are less supportive of victims than are women (e.g., Brown & Testa, 2008). The authors also note that men seem to be more susceptible to factors influencing blame attributions of rape victims than women, citing research on victim characteristics, resistance, and attire (Pollard, 1992). They surmised that, in comparison with victims who are blamed due to intoxication or appearance, victims who are blamed due to their lack of support from others are doubly disadvantaged; they are disbelieved and blamed by loved ones after their attack, and then are blamed further by others due to this lack of support (Anderson & Lyons, 2005).

Although Anderson and Lyons (2005) provided preliminary information about the influence of social support, it was unclear whether negative support increased blame or positive support decreased blame without the inclusion of a neutral support condition (Anderson & Lyons, 2005). To address this, Brown and Testa (2008) conducted a similar study that included a neutrally supportive manipulation in which loved ones were concerned for the victim but were not particularly supportive or unsupportive. Similarly, they found victim judgments were less positive and perpetrator judgments were less negative when the victim received negative support. Exposure to positive support had very little impact on blame attributions for either perpetrator or victim, perhaps due to the tendency for negative information to influence social judgments greater than positive information (Skowronski & Carlston, 1989). Contrary to the study by Anderson and Lyons (2005), however, the effect of social support did not differ for men and women, as women attributed significantly less blame to the victim than men across all three social support conditions (Brown & Testa, 2008).

Whereas Anderson and Lyons (2005) found evidence to suggest that social support is more salient for men and Brown and Testa (2008) did not find any gender differences, other research suggests that women may in fact be more influenced by the social environment than men (Mercer, Allen, & Lilly, 2017). A sample of undergraduate students participated in a socially influenced risk recognition task in which they listened to an audio recording (Marx & Gross, 1995) of an increasingly coercive sexual encounter between a man and woman that ultimately culminates in a completed date rape and were instructed to press a button when they believe the perpetrator, a male, should refrain from attempting further contact. Participants were randomized to complete the task with a same-gender or opposite-gender confederate who was instructed to press the button only after the participant had. The results suggested that women’s risk recognition was more influenced by the social environment than men’s. Specifically, female participants had better risk recognition in the presence of a male confederate, presumably because they adopted the role of “sexual gatekeeper,” whereas in the presence of a female confederate, female participants took significantly longer to press the button to stop the sexual encounter. Several female participants commented that they had taken their social cues from the female confederate, with some allowing the encounter to progress all the way to completed rape because they were waiting for the female confederate to stop the encounter first (Mercer et al., 2017). Thus, although it is apparent that the social environment surrounding sexual assault is notably influential, it remains unclear how it may differentially influence men and women. Moreover, in addition to external influences, there may be alternative, subconscious explanations for why victim blaming is more likely to occur after a victim receives negative support from others, and why the tendency to blame may differ based on observer gender.

Assumptions of a Just World

Although several outward victim- and observer-specific characteristics have been identified as predictors of blame, a deeper examination of victim blaming among individuals may reveal subconscious, egocentric motivators for blaming. One motivation for victim blaming may be the need to interpret experiences in a way that is consistent with the belief in a just world. A just world is one in which good things happen to good people and bad things happen to bad people (Lerner, 1980). Threats to JWB, such as an innocent victim experiencing a violent attack, are intolerable and necessitate alterations in the individual’s perception of the victim so that the victim becomes deserving of the tragedy. As a result, a handful of studies have linked high JWB to greater attributions of victim blame (e.g., Furnham, 2003; Thomas, Amburgey, & Ellis, 2016; VanDeursen, Pope, & Warner, 2012; Yamawaki, 2009). Some research has found an inverse relationship between JWB and blame for men and women, such that higher JWB predict negative victim judgments from men and lower JWB predict negative victim judgments from women (Kleinke & Meyer, 1990), although this inverse relationship has not always been found. Other research has found that JWB were predictive of victim blame for female but not male observers (Sinclair & Bourne, 1998), and still some found no relation between JWB and victim blame of assault survivors (Brems & Wagner, 1994). In two separate studies, JWB predicted increased victim blame and decreased perpetrator blame, and negatively influenced perceptions of whether the event constituted rape (Strömwall, Alfredsson, & Landström, 2013a, 2013b).

The individual who threatens JWB the most is the innocent victim whose suffering persists, the “victims of unbelievable unjust deprivation” (Lerner, 1980), and individuals with high JWB are more likely to help a victim whose suffering they believe they can stop rather than victims whose suffering they do not believe they can stop (Miller, 1977). A study centered on a mugging victim, for example, found that high just world threat (i.e., perpetrator was never caught) predicted greater victim blame and derogation compared with low just world threat (i.e., perpetrator was caught and punished; VanDeursen et al., 2012). As such, rape victims who are met with negative reactions and blame by loved ones or formal support sources may be viewed as victims of persistent suffering, thus increasing the need for those with high JWB to further derogate and blame. Conversely, a victim who experiences positive support may not be blamed as much because they represent a lesser threat to JWB. Indeed, a vast amount of research has been devoted to examining how JWB manifest as victim blame, yet little is known about how these beliefs, in combination with social influence, may differentially affect blame for men and women, despite the fact that these subconscious cognitive processes may play a central role in the motivation for victim blaming.

Overall, the literature suggests that men attribute more blame to rape victims than women, but it remains unclear how and to what extent men and women are affected by external and internal factors. Some research suggests that external factors are more salient for men (e.g., Anderson & Lyons, 2005; Pollard, 1992), whereas other research suggests the opposite (e.g., Mercer et al., 2017). Similarly, although a great deal of evidence suggests that JWB predicts victim blame (e.g., Furnham, 2003; Thomas et al., 2016; VanDeursen et al., 2012; Yamawaki, 2009), studies have found conflicting evidence for how this relationship differs for men and women (e.g., Brems & Wagner, 1994; Kleinke & Meyer, 1990; Sinclair & Bourne, 1998). Thus, the primary aim of the current study is to clarify the ways in which social support and JWB moderate the relationship between gender and victim blame.

Given the findings of previous research and theory, it was hypothesized that (a) women would attribute less blame than men across all social support conditions; (b) victims in the positive support condition would be blamed least, followed by those in the neutral condition, followed by those in the negative support condition; and (c) JWB would predict greater victim blame. In addition, moderation effects were hypothesized such that (d) JWB would moderate the relationship between gender and blame, and (e) social support would moderate the relationship between gender and blame, though specific predictions about the direction of moderation effects were not made given contradictory findings in the literature.

Method

Participants

Data were obtained from 383 undergraduate students enrolled in an introductory psychology course at a large Midwestern university. The sample was 51.8% female and ranged in age from 18 to 53 years, with a mean age of 19.55 (SD = 2.90). Participants identified their race as 59.6% White, 23.2% Black, 5.4% Asian or South Asian, 0.8% Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander, 0.5% American Indian or Alaskan Native, and 7.8% Other. An additional 2.7% did not provide their race, and 16.2% identified their ethnicity as Hispanic or Latino/a.

Measures

Assault history

To control for participant history of rape, participants completed the revised version of the Sexual Experiences Survey–Short Form Victimization (SES-SFV; Koss et al., 2007). The SES-SFV is comprised of seven primary questions about adult sexual victimization (e.g., “A man put his penis into my vagina, or someone inserted fingers or objects without my consent”) and follow-up question assessing specific tactics used during each experience. Participants were categorized as having a history of sexual assault if they endorsed one or more experience of sexual victimization on the SES-SFV. Approximately 35% of the sample (n = 109) reported a history of sexual victimization, 67% of whom were female (n = 73).

JWB

JWB were measured using the Global Belief in a Just World Scale (GBJWS; Lipkus, 1991). The GBJWS is a seven-item questionnaire that assesses the degree to which people believe the world is a just place in which people get what they deserve. Participants are asked to indicate the degree to which they agree or disagree with each statement on a 6-point scale ranging from strong disagreement to strong agreement, where higher scores indicate a stronger belief in a just world (e.g., “I basically feel that the world is a fair place.”) Scores are summed and range from 7 to 42, with higher scores indicating greater endorsement of JWB. Although many measures of JWB exist, the GBJWS has reliably demonstrated strong internal consistency (i.e., Cronbach’s αs between .65 and .89; Hellman, Muilenburg-Trevino, & Worley, 2008; Liao, Hong, & Rounds, 2016). Similarly, internal consistency for the GBJWS was adequate in the current study (α = .82). The sample reported moderate levels of JWB, M = 23.86, SD = 5.48. The total JWB score was mean-centered when entered into the regression equation.

Perceived victim similarity

To control for potential effects of perceived similarity with the victim, which has been found to negatively influence blame attributions (e.g., Workman & Freeburg, 1999), six items were included which examined perceived personal similarity (e.g., “How close in build or physical fitness do you imagine you are to Jessica?”) and relational similarity (e.g., “How similar do you imagine your group of friends is to Jessica’s group of friends?”) to the victim on a 4-point Likert-type scale. Reliability analyses confirmed adequate internal consistency (α = .78).

Social desirability

Social desirability was measured as a covariate using the Marlowe–Crowne Social Desirability Scale (MC-SDS; Crowne & Marlowe, 1960), a 33-item questionnaire that detects socially desirable responding. The MC-SDS is a common measure of social desirability and historically has yielded strong reliability, with internal consistency coefficients between .73 and .88 (Robinson, Shaver, & Wrightsman, 1991) and is significantly correlated with Lie scores on the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (Crowne & Marlowe, 1960). In the current study, internal consistency of the MC-SDS is somewhat low (α = .67); however, due to its empirical support in previous research and its use only as a covariate and not a predictor of interest in the current study, the MC-SDS remained in analyses to control for socially desirable responding.

Victim blame

Attributions of blame toward the rape victim in the vignette were measured using three items (Brown & Testa, 2008) in which participants are asked to rate the degree to which they blame the victim for what happened on a 9-point scale (e.g., “To what extent is Jessica to blame for what happened?”). Internal consistency for the items was very strong in previous research (α = .92; Brown & Testa, 2008) as well as the current study (α = .89).

Procedure

Participants were recruited using an online survey platform and were told that they would be reading actual transcripts from interviews conducted by the local campus police about an incident that was reported by a classmate during a previous semester at the university. After providing informed consent, participants answered demographic questions and items examining their JWB. Participants then read fictional police transcripts adapted from Brown and Testa (2008) involving an acquaintance rape between two students. The vignettes were designed to appear as authentic legal documents and were comprised of interviews with the perpetrator (i.e., Kevin), victim (i.e., Jessica), and the victim’s friend and sister. Assault context and characteristics remained the same across conditions; all participants read the same victim and perpetrator interviews in which Jessica was sexually assaulted by an acquaintance while unconscious after becoming intoxicated at a party.

Participants were then randomly assigned to one of three social support conditions: (a) positive support, in which Jessica’s sister and friend describe supporting Jessica by listening to her, being there for her, and holding the perpetrator accountable; (b) negative support, in which Jessica’s sister and friend describe avoiding her, feeling ashamed of her, blaming her, and feeling as though she were overreacting; and (c) neutral support, in which Jessica’s sister and friend describe feeling shock and concern over what happened to Jessica, but not indicating clear support either way. In the original use of the vignettes, a one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) found that the manipulation effect was significant, with post hoc Tukey analysis confirming that family and friends were viewed as least supportive in the negative support condition (M = 3.11, SD = 1.20), and most supportive in the positive support condition (M = 7.68, SD = 1.07). The neutral support condition reflected perceptions of intermediate levels of support (M = 5.39, SD = 1.28). Group means in all three support conditions were significantly different from one another, supporting their use as clear and distinct conditions of social support (Brown & Testa, 2008). In the current study, 121 participants were randomly assigned to the positive support condition (62 male, 59 female), 122 to the neutral support condition (54 male, 68 female), and 120 to the negative support condition (62 male, 58 female).

Results

The data were examined for outliers and invalid responding. Forty-six participants in the current study were excluded in analyses because they incorrectly responded to one or both forced response questions (e.g., “Please select false”), indicating that they may have been responding to items without reading them thoroughly. The final sample, therefore, included 337 participants. See Table 1 for descriptive statistics and bivariate correlations.

Table 1.

Descriptive Statistics and Bivariate Correlations.

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9
1. Gender	—
2. JWB	.08	—
3. Victim Blame	−.23^†	.17**	—
4. Social Desirability	.06	.06	.04	—
5. Assault History	−.24^†	−.09	−.05	−.14*	—
6. Perceived Similarity	−.32^†	.01	−.13*	−.04	.17**	—
7. Social Support-Neutral	−.07	−.11	.10	−.02	.05	.07	—
8. Social Support-Negative	.04	.09	>.01	.04	−.05	−.17**	—	—
9. Social Support-Positive	.06	.02	−.10	−.01	.01	.09	—	—	—
M	—	23.86	4.06	16.79	—	2.34	—	—	—
SD	—	5.48	2.09	4.60	—	0.64	—	—	—

Note. Gender (1 = male 2 = female); JWB on a scale from 7 to 42; Victim blame on a scale from 1 to 9; Social Desirability on a scale from 0 to 32; Assault history (1 = yes, 0 = no); Perceived similarity on a scale from 1 to 5. JWB = Just World Beliefs.

†

p ≤ .001. *p < .05. **p < .01.

Manipulation Check

To confirm that the social support manipulation was effective, a one-way ANOVA was computed in SPSS on the manipulation scale, which included three items tmeasuring the perceived amount of support provided by the victim’s family and friend. The manipulation effect was significant, F(2, 308) = 163.76, p < .001. Post hoc Tukey analyses indicated that the effects were in the expected directions; participants in the positive support condition perceived the highest levels of family and friend support (M = 7.88, SD = 1.24), participants in the neutral support condition perceived moderate levels of family and friend support (M = 5.91, SD = 1.73), and participants in the negative support condition perceived the lowest levels of family and friend support (M = 3.57, SD = 2.10).

Hypothesis 1: Victim Blame by Gender

An analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) with Bonferonni adjustment was conducted in SPSS to determine whether blame was greater for male participants (a) than for female participants (b) across condition and levels of JWB. As predicted in Hypothesis 1, men attributed greater blame to the victim (M = 4.56, SD = 2.00; adjusted M = 4.58, SE = .17) than women (M = 3.58, SD = 2.06; adjusted M = 3.59, SE = .16), a difference that was statistically significant, η² = .06, F(1, 298) = 18.60, p < .001.

Hypothesis 2: Victim Blame by Social Support

An ANCOVA with Bonferonni adjustment was conducted in SPSS to determine whether the social support manipulation influenced levels of blame, controlling for gender and JWB. It was predicted that the negative support condition (condition = 1) would yield the greatest victim blame, followed by the neutral support condition (condition = 0), followed by the positive support condition (condition = 2). When controlling for gender and JWB, significant differences in victim blame by condition were observed, η² = .02, F(2, 297) = 3.18, p = .04. Although the omnibus test revealed significant differences, the positive condition yielded the least blame as predicted (M = 3.78, SD = 2.05; adjusted M = 3.74, SE = .20), whereas the neutral condition yielded slightly greater levels of victim blame (M = 4.34, SD = 1.98; adjusted M = 4.44, SE = .20) than the negative condition (M = 4.07, SD = 2.21; adjusted M = 4.00, SE = .20). Pairwise comparisons reveal that differences in victim blame are statistically significant only between positive and neutral conditions (p = .01). Thus, Hypothesis 2 was only partially supported.

When comparing the effect of social support for men and women separately, an important distinction emerged. Whereas levels of blame did not differ significantly for men across social support conditions, women’s attribution of blame was influenced by social support (see Table 2). Specifically, pairwise comparisons indicate that women attributed significantly less blame to the victim that received positive support (M difference = −1.18, SE = .38, p < .01) than to the victim that received neutral support, η² = .06, F(2, 153) = 5.04, p < .01. In addition, differences in blame attributions between negative and neutral conditions were trending toward significance for female participants (M difference = −.69, SE = .38, p = .07).

Table 2.

Victim Blame Based on Gender and Social Support Condition, Controlling for JWB.

Social Support Condition	Men: Victim Blame (n = 141)	Women: Victim Blame (n = 157)
Negative	4.59 (.29)	3.48 (.29)
Neutral	4.61 (.31)	4.17 (.26)**
Positive	4.56 (.28)	3.00 (.28)**

Note. Victim blame scores represent adjusted M scores from 1 to 9; higher numbers indicate greater levels of blame. Covariates in the model are evaluated at a value of JWB = 24.26 for men and 23.42 for women. Values in parentheses represent standard errors. Bonferonni-adjusted pairwise comparisons reveal a significant difference in blame attribution between positive and neutral support for women only. JWB = Just World Beliefs.

p < .01.

Hypothesis 3: Victim Blame by JWB

A linear regression was conducted in SPSS to determine whether JWB predicted victim blame, controlling for gender and social support. JWB explained significant unique variance in victim blame above and beyond gender and social support condition, β = .17, p < .01. As predicted in Hypothesis 3, greater endorsement of JWB predicted greater attributions of blame to the fictional rape victim.

Hypotheses 4 and 5: JWB and Social Support as Moderators

A hierarchical linear regression predicting victim blame was conducted in SPSS to examine main effects and moderation effects separately. In Step 1, independent variables included gender, mean-centered JWB, social support (dummy coded with the neutral condition as reference group), and the covariates of social desirability, assault history, and perceived similarity to the victim.¹ The model was statistically significant (p < .001) and accounted for approximately 11% of the variance in victim blame. Gender (β = .25, p < .001) and JWB (β = .16, p < .01) significantly predicted blame, and the positive social support condition predicted significantly less blame compared with the neutral support condition (β = −.17, p < .01). The negative support condition predicted slightly less blame than the neutral support condition, but this comparison was statistically nonsignificant (β = −.10, p = .12). None of the covariates were significant. Moderation effects were added in Step 2, which added an additional 2% of explained variance (p = .07). The effect of gender on victim blame was significantly different only for the positive versus neutral social support comparison (β = .23, p < .05). JWB did not significantly moderate the relationship between gender and victim blame, although the relationship was trending (β = −.14, p = .09) (see Figure 1). In Step 3, three-way moderation effects were entered but were nonsignificant, and their inclusion did not contribute significant additional variance in victim blame (R² change = .001, p = .79).

Figure 1.

Social support and JWB as moderators to the relationship between gender and victim blame.

To examine conditional effects, Model 2, which includes two moderators, was tested in Hayes PROCESS (Hayes, 2013). Conditional effects revealed that the model was significant for some levels of JWB and within some social support conditions (see Table 3). Specifically, the effect of gender on victim blame in the positive support condition was different than the effect of gender on victim blame in the neutral condition. Moreover, this effect differs by JWB such that the effect of gender on victim blame is strongest for low JWB and weakest for high JWB. JWB and social support significantly moderated the relationship between gender and victim blame within the positive support condition. Compared with other social support conditions, the model effect was consistently strongest for participants in the positive support condition, suggesting that positive support may have the greatest impact on the relationship between gender and blame attributions. The model was also significant in the negative support condition among participants with low (b = 1.42, p < .001) and moderate (b = 1.00, p < .001) levels of JWB, but not for participants high in JWB (b = .28, p = .09), although this relationship was trending toward significance. For participants in the neutral support condition, the model was significant for only those low in JWB (b = .93, p < .05), and was not significant for those with moderate or high JWB. Of note, the moderating effect of JWB appeared to be consistently weaker for those high in JWB compared with those with low or moderate JWB between positive, negative, and neutral conditions.

Table 3.

Conditional Effects of Gender on Victim Blame at Values of the Moderators.

Social Support Condition	JWB	Effect	SE	t value	LLCI	ULCI
Negative	Low	1.42†	.35	4.00	0.72	2.12
	Average	1.00†	.26	3.87	0.49	1.51
	High	0.58	.34	1.69	−0.10	1.26
Neutral	Low	0.93*	.41	2.26	0.12	1.74
	Average	0.51	.34	1.48	−0.17	1.20
	High	0.09	.42	0.21	−0.74	0.93
Positive	Low	1.91†	.44	4.32	1.04	2.77
	Average	1.50	.36	4.19	0.79	2.19
	High	1.07**	.41	2.60	0.26	1.88

Note. Values of JWB are at the mean (average = 23.87), one standard deviation below the mean (low = 18.41), and one standard deviation above the mean (high = 29.34). Assault history, social desirability, and perceived victim similarity included as covariates. LLCI = lower limit confidence interval; ULCI = upper limit confidence interval; JWB = Just World Beliefs.

†

p ≤ .001. *p < .05. **p < .01.

Discussion

The current study sought to examine the moderating effects of social support and JWB on the well-established relationship between observer gender and attributions of victim blame. As predicted, men attributed significantly greater blame to the rape victim than women. This finding is consistent with the well-documented relationship between gender and victim blame in the literature (e.g., Black & Gold, 2008; Grubb & Harrower, 2008; Kleinke & Meyer, 1990; Workman & Freeburg, 1999) and provides further evidence that men are less sympathetic to rape victims than women. Also consistent with previous literature (Furnham, 2003; Kleinke & Meyer, 1990; Strömwall et al., 2013a, 2013b; Yamawaki, 2009), JWB significantly predicted victim blame above and beyond gender and social support, suggesting that stronger JWB in both men and women predict greater attributions of blame and vice versa. Individuals who believe that the world is a just and fair place in which people get what they deserve likely view rape victims through that same lens and form the assumption that the victim must be at least partially to blame for what happened. Conversely, those who do not believe in a just world may have a better understanding that bad things can happen to good people and may form their conclusions about blame on contextual information rather than on beliefs about right and wrong.

Interestingly, the main effect of social support was significantly predictive of victim blame only between the positive and neutral condition; no significant differences were found when comparing blame between the negative and neutral conditions, although the relationship was trending. Participants in the current study attributed significantly less blame to the positively supported victim, but reported similar levels of blame across the negative and neutral conditions. This finding suggests that learning that a victim received negative support from family and friends may not be as influential as learning that a victim received positive support. It may also be that observers have an overall tendency to attribute a baseline level of blame to victims regardless, but learning that the victim received positive support from others may work to reduce a default level of blame, whereas learning about negative support may serve to only reinforce what was already assumed. The lack of detail provided in the neutral condition may have also led participants to form their own conclusions. Perhaps observers, in the absence of contextual social information from others, will default to assuming more blame on the part of the victim. Given that previous research has found significant differences between the levels of social support using the same vignettes (Brown & Testa, 2008), our findings may also be reflective of the lack of significant differences in blame across the conditions. In previous studies, participants attributed more blame to the victim that received negative support from family and friends (Anderson & Lyons, 2005; Brown & Testa, 2008), followed by the victim that received neutral support (Brown & Testa, 2008), and attributed the least blame to the victim that received positive support from family and friends (Anderson & Lyons, 2005; Brown & Testa, 2008). In the current study, however, the conditions of social support did not differ significantly overall or in expected directions.

The main hypothesis of the current study that social support and JWB would independently moderate the relationship between gender and victim blame was partially supported. Social support was a significant moderator to the relationship between gender and victim blame, but differences emerged only for the positive to neutral support comparison; consistent with main effects, the comparison of victim blame between negative and neutral support was nonsignificant. The results suggest that gender differences exist in attributions of blame when a victim receives positive support from friends and family. Specifically, women attributed significantly less blame to the positively supported victim compared with the neutrally supported victim, but no significant differences emerged between the negative and positive or neutral condition, nor did any differences emerge for any condition among male participants–attributions of blame were consistent across all social support conditions among male participants.

Although contrary to some previous research (e.g., Anderson & Lyons, 2005; Brown & Testa, 2008; Pollard, 1992), the results support recent research that suggests that women may in fact be more susceptible to social influences than men (Mercer et al., 2017). For instance, it has been suggested that men attribute more blame to victims due to characterological factors and, as such, victims are seen as morally responsible and face inevitable blame for what happened. Women, on the contrary, may respond more to situational characteristics and, as a result, blame may be more dependent on the perceived recklessness of the victim’s behavior rather than on perceptions of her character (Ward, 1995). The male participants in the current study, then, may have been more influenced by the interviews with Kevin and Jessica, whereas female participants may have been more influenced by the interviews with Jessica’s friend and sister, which provide greater context to the overall situation. If it were indeed the case that female observers are more influenced by positive support than negative, it would provide an interesting alternative to findings that victims are more affected by receiving the latter than the former following disclosure (Campbell et al., 2001; Ullman, 2010; Ullman et al., 2007). Before drawing these conclusions, however, it is important to replicate this finding in future research, as they are contrary to previous research using the same vignettes (Brown & Testa, 2008). In addition, it should be noted that levels of blame between all conditions were not high, suggesting that overall participants do not tend to attribute a great deal of blame to victims within this type of research methodology and population. Future research may wish to eliminate the objective descriptions of the assault from victim and perpetrator and instead only provide participants with descriptions of social support. The results of the current study appear to suggest that positive support may not be insignificant to rape victims after all; positive support may contribute to less victim blaming sentiments from other women, which may indirectly affect victim outcomes such as self-blame, maladaptive coping, and PTSD.

Contrary to predictions, the moderation effect of JWB was only trending toward significance. Interestingly, and similar to social support, JWB appeared to be more strongly related to blame for female than male participants. Perhaps attributions of blame by men are more influenced by other factors, such as rape myth acceptance or holding overall more negative views of victims, whereas attributions of blame by women are more influenced by their beliefs about the world and their perceptions of treatment from others. Furthermore, JWB had the strongest effect on the relationship of gender and blame within the positive support condition whereas JWB had the least effect within the neutral support condition. This contradicts previous research that has postulated that JWB serve a protective function to the individual, such that victims are blamed most when they represent that greatest threat to JWB (Lerner, 1980; Lerner & Simons, 1966); theoretically, the victim in the negative support condition should have evoked the strongest effect of JWB due to the continued “undo suffering” on behalf of the victim, whereas the victim in the positive support condition should have evoked the weakest effect of JWB because she represented the lowest threat to JWB. It is possible that this surprising finding may be due to the fact that across all three conditions, high JWB had the weakest effect and low JWB had the strongest. The findings also mirror inconsistent findings within the just world literature and highlight the need for more stringent research on the topic.

Limitations to the current study and suggestions for future research should be noted. First, the results are limited to use of vignettes, which may not have been sufficiently realistic to some participants. The vignettes were modeled after police transcripts and were stated to be derived from an assault that occurred at the university, but participants may not have believed the instructions or found the content within the vignettes realistic. Despite this potential, the vignettes have been used successfully in previous research (Brown & Testa, 2008). Second, the results are based on a sample of college students and may not be representative of other populations that may interact with victims. College undergraduates may not vary significantly in their JWB. Moreover, the sample was predominantly White, a noteworthy limitation given that racial and ethnic differences have been found in JWB research. Namely, Black participants tend to ascribe less to JWB than White participants, and participants who identify as Latino/a ascribe more strongly to JWB than non-Latino/as (Hunt, 2000). A predominantly White sample may not accurately reflect the impact of JWB on diverse populations. Future research may seek to include a more socioeconomically and academically diverse sample. In addition, the stability of JWB in the current sample is unclear. Items assessing JWB were administered prior to reading the vignettes and as such, it is possible that reading the vignettes may have affected an individual’s state beliefs about the justness of the world, which would convolute the relationships examined. Future studies may want to collect information about JWB before and after the manipulation to account for any manipulation-related changes. Last, increasing public attention toward sexual assault may begin to negatively affect researcher’s ability to measure explicit beliefs about blame. College students may be becoming increasingly more informed about the phenomenon of rape and thus be attributing less blame toward victims over time, whereas other students may simply be more aware of not explicitly expressing these victim blaming sentiments as it has become less acceptable. This may explain why attributions of blame were in the low to moderate range in the current study. Research on rape victim blame moving forward may wish to examine more discrete ways to assess victim blaming sentiments.

Despite some limitations, the current study provides greater evidence for gender effects within victim blaming, as well as the influences of JWB and social support. The results suggest that JWB have a unique effect on the relationship between gender and blame at varying levels of social support. In addition, tentative evidence suggests that social support and JWB may be more influential for female observers than for male observers. Taken together, the current study extends previous research regarding factors that influence victim blame. Studies seeking to understand the complexities of victim blaming may help inform rape prevention and/or bystander intervention programs so that they can more accurately target factors likely to induce victim blaming. Similarly, education and training for professionals working with victims (e.g., medical professionals, law enforcement) may wish to include psychoeducation about the common pitfalls of victim blaming that may inadvertently influence outcomes, such as the treatment of patients or whether a police report is thoroughly investigated. Although contrary to previous research (Brown & Testa, 2008), female participants in the current study were positively influenced by the positive support condition, which offers some hope that refusing to blame a victim of rape may generate a domino effect of belief and support in female peers, thus creating more accepting and less hostile environments for rape victims.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

Author Biographies

Caitlin M. Pinciotti, MA, is a doctoral student in the clinical psychology program at Northern Illinois University. Her research focuses on sexual assault victimization, including factors that facilitate or inhibit healing, such as the availability of social support, disclosure experiences, world beliefs, and interventions such as self-defense.

Holly K. Orcutt, PhD, is a professor in the Department of Psychology at Northern Illinois University. Her research focuses on the broader framework of traumatic stress, including the prevention of trauma exposure, and risk and prevention factors such as emotion regulation, acceptance, and avoidance. Recently, she has conducted research using psychophysiological techniques to measure fear potentiated startle in female survivors of trauma.

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