The Effects of Exposure to Negative Social Reactions and Participant Gender on Attitudes and Behavior Toward a Rape Victim

Research has shown that judgments of a rape victim could be influenced by exposure to negative social reactions: students indicated less willingness to provide sympathy and support to a hypothetical rape victim when they learned she had been blamed and stigmatized. The current study, which utilized a sample of 100 college students, replicated and extended these results and showed that men were affected by others’ negative social reactions in their hypothetical judgments and in their behavioral responses to a rape victim (sitting farther away). This study demonstrates the potentially far-reaching detrimental influence of negative social reactions