But she was unfaithful: benevolent sexism and reactions to rape victims who violate traditional gender role expectations

Sex Roles: A Journal of Research,  Sept, 2002  by G. Tendayi Viki,  Dominic Abrams

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To analyze the impact of victim type and BS, hierarchical regression analysis was employed. In the first step, victim type and BS were entered, and in the second step the interaction term (BS x Victim Type) was entered. The overall equation was significant, F = 6.81, p < .01. Significant main effects for victim type and BS were obtained (see beta coefficients in Table II). As expected, more blame was attributed to the "married mother" than to the "control" victim (M = 3.78, SD = 1.13; M = 3.03, SD = 0.81, respectively). The significant positive relationship between BS and victim blame indicates that the higher individuals scored on BS, the more they blamed the rape victim. These main effects were qualified by a significant interaction between BS and victim type (p = .047; see Table II). Simple effects analyses revealed that in the control condition the relationship between BS and victim blame was positive but failed to reach significance, [beta] = .14, t(31) = 0.77, ns. Although this result is in the expected direction, it is not consistent with the results from our previous research (e.g., Abrams et al., in press), where the positive relationship between BS and victim blame was found to reach statistical significance in a similar condition. In contrast, in the "married mother" condition there was a significant relationship between victim blame and BS, [beta] = .51, t(24) = 2.84, p < .01. Thus, the higher individuals scored on BS, the more they blamed the "married mother" for the rape. These effects remained significant even after the effects of IM, HS, and RMA were partialled out before entering BS, victim type, and the interaction term in the regression, pr = .29, [beta] = .25, t(56) = 2.00, p = .05. Separate hierarchical regression analyses (similar to those conducted for BS) were performed to examine whether HS and RMA interacted with victim type to predict victim blame. As predicted, the interaction effects between victim type and HS or RMA failed to reach significance (all ps> .05).

DISCUSSION

The present results are consistent with our main hypotheses. As expected, participants assigned more blame to the adulterous "married mother" in comparison to the "control" victim. This is consistent with previous research (e.g., Cassidy & Hurrell, 1995) and suggests that perceptions of the appropriateness of the victim's behavior may have some influence on the participants' reactions to different types of acquaintance rape victims. This proposal is further supported by the finding that individuals who are high in BS attributed more blame to the "married mother" than did low BS individuals. Thus, BS appears to provide an alternative mechanism through which some of the observed differences in victim blame can be accounted for. According to Glick et al. (2000), benevolent sexists have a tendency to idealize women who conform to traditional gender roles As such, a married woman who is raped during an act of potential infidelity could be viewed as grossly violating high BS individuals' behavioral standards and ma y then be blamed for the event.