Perceptions of Sexual Violence in Dating Relationships: Presentation Medium and Couple Characteristics

Undergraduate students evaluated scenarios depicting violence in a long-term dating relationship—in either video or written form, and involving either a male or female aggressor in either a same- or other-gender relationship. Other than the genders of the victims and assailants, the details of the scenarios were identical. Results showed that participants rated written scenarios as more powerful than video scenarios and believed that sexual assault was more likely to have happened in the written than in the video scenarios. Compared to men, women were more emotionally impacted by the scenarios, thought sexual assault was more likely to have happened, were more likely to think the aggressor wanted to have sex with the victim, and were less likely to think the victim wanted to have sex with the aggressor. Participants who rated other-sex scenarios thought sexual assault was more likely to have occurred, that the aggressor more likely wanted to have sex with the victim, and that the victim less likely wanted to have sex with the aggressor than those rating same-sex scenarios. When women were portrayed as the victims, regardless of relationship type, the scenario was more emotionally evocative. On average, participants strongly agreed that sexual assault had occurred in each of the scenarios.