#HeToo? Men trivialize cases of sexual harassment by a female aggressor toward a male victim, but women do not

The #MeToo movement spurred a handful of corresponding #HeToo cases, in which men voiced their experiences of sexual harassment by female aggressors. The public seemed to respond with less moral outrage to these cases, suggesting that people trivialize the sexual harassment of men. We performed two experiments (total N = 260), in which participants read a description of sexual harassment from a manager toward an employee. Half of the participants were randomly assigned a #metoo condition in which the manager was referred to as a man, and the employee was described as a woman. The other half were assigned to a #hetoo condition, in which the manager was described as a woman, and the employee was referred to as a man. Our analyses revealed a striking pattern of gender differences. Female participants perceived the case as equally bad whether the aggressor was male or female. Male participants reacted equally strongly to the case of sexual harassment performed by a male aggressor. By contrast, male participants viewed the case as far less serious and warranting milder reactions when the aggressor was female and the victim was male. This suggests the trivialization of sexual harassment of male victims by female aggressors is largely driven by men.