Unacknowledged versus acknowledged rape victims: Situational factors and posttraumatic stress.

Layman, Melissa J.; Gidycz, Christine A.; Lynn, Steven Jay

doi:10.1037/0021-843x.105.1.124

Cited by 138 publications

(223 citation statements)

References 20 publications

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“…Thus, asking men specifically about rape does not identify additional perpetrators. This corresponds to past research with victims and perpetrators, which indicates that few label these events as rape, perhaps because they do not fit the prototypic rape involving a sudden physical attack by a stranger [Falk, 1998;Layman et al, 1996].…”

Section: Self-reported Rates Of Sexual Assault Perpetrationsupporting

confidence: 74%

Cross-sectional predictors of sexual assault perpetration in a community sample of single African American and Caucasian men

et al. 2005

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Computer-assisted self-interviews were completed with a random sample of 163 unmarried Caucasian and African American men in a large metropolitan area. Almost a quarter (24.5%) of these men acknowledged committing an act since the age of 14 that met standard legal definitions of attempted or completed rape; an additional 39% had committed another type of sexual assault involving forced sexual contact or verbal coercion. An expanded version of the Malamuth et al.[1991] confluence model was examined using path analysis. The number of sexual assaults perpetrated by participants was associated with the direct or indirect effects of childhood sexual abuse, adolescent delinquency, alcohol problems, sexual dominance, positive attitudes about casual sexual relationships, and pressure from peers to engage in sexual relationships. Additionally, empathy buffered the relationship between sexual dominance and perpetration. The pattern of results was highly similar for African American and Caucasian men. The implications of these findings for sexual assault measurement are discussed and suggestions are made for alternative treatment programs.

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Section: Self-reported Rates Of Sexual Assault Perpetrationsupporting

confidence: 74%

Cross-sectional predictors of sexual assault perpetration in a community sample of single African American and Caucasian men

et al. 2005

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“…Cascardi, Riggs, Hearst-Ikeda, and Foa (1996) reported that women raped in locations rated as safe and women attacked by dangerous assailants had more PTSD even when assault brutality was controlled. Layman, Gidycz, and Lynn's study of college women showed that acknowledged rape victims experienced more forceful assaults, resisted more, demonstrated clearer refusal to the attacker, and reported more PTSD symptoms (Layman et al, 1996). In a convenience sample of 102 communityresiding rape survivors (Campbell et al, 1999), neither victim demographics nor rape characteristics were associated with posttraumatic stress symptoms, but victims of known attackers who received few community services and experienced high secondary victimization postassault had more symptoms.…”

mentioning

confidence: 98%

Predictors of PTSD symptom severity and social reactions in sexual assault victims

Ullman

Filipas

2001

Journal of Traumatic Stress

427

376

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Demographics, assault variables, and postassault responses were analyzed as correlates of PTSD symptom severity in a sample of 323 sexual assault victims. Regression analyses indicated that less education, greater perceived life threat, and receipt of more negative social reactions upon disclosing assault were each related to greater PTSD symptom severity. Ethnic minority victims reported more negative social reactions from others. Victims of more severe sexual victimization reported fewer positive, but more negative reactions from others. Greater extent of disclosure of the assault was related to more positive and fewer negative social reactions. Telling more persons about the assault was related to more negative and positive reactions. Implications of these results for developing contextual theoretical models of rape-related PTSD are discussed.Keywords posttraumatic stress; social reactions; sexual assault; disclosure Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a common consequence of rape experiences with one-third of female rape victims identified in community samples experiencing PTSD at some time after the assault (Kilpatrick, Edmunds, & Seymour, 1992). In longitudinal research assessing rape victims immediately after assault, PTSD characterized 94% of victims within 2 weeks postassault and 47% of victims within 3 months postassault (Rothbaum, Foa, Riggs, Murdock, & Walsh, 1992). A number of studies have examined correlates of the PTSD diagnosis or PTSD symptom severity in sexual assault victims to identify those survivors most likely to develop the disorder after the assault. A study of representatively sampled sexual assault victims by Frazier et al. (1997) showed that over half of women (58%) who nominated sexual assault as their worst traumatic event had PTSD in their lifetime. Multivariate analyses showed that young, White women who perceived the assault to be life-threatening, were more upset at the time of the assault, and those who blamed themselves and others for the assault had more PTSD symptoms. These results suggest that demographic background, traumatic event characteristics, and postassault victim responses all may be predictive of PTSD.Rape appears to be more likely than other traumatic events to result in PTSD at least in part because specific traumatic characteristics (e.g., perceived life threat) are more common for rape than for other traumatic events (Frazier et al., 1997). However, even when event characteristics are controlled, having a rape history predicts unique variance in PTSD risk, implying that something about rape itself, or postassault responses to rape, contributes to PTSD in addition to these event characteristics (Frazier et al., 1997;Kilpatrick, Saunders, Amick-McMullan, & Best, 1989). Perhaps the personally intrusive nature of rape is what makes it uniquely traumatic. Resnick, Kilpatrick, Dansky, Saunders, and Best (1993) studied a national sample of women and found that perceived life threat and physical injury were related to more PTSD, a diagnosis more common in...

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“…Numerous studies have found that the closer an incident is to this script, the more likely it is to be labeled as rape. For example, women are more likely to label the incident as rape if the perpetrator was a stranger or barely known acquaintance (Kahn, Jackson, Kully, Badger, & Halvorsen, 2003;Koss et al, 1988), if it involved physical force, if they resisted physically, if a weapon was used, or if they sustained an injury (Bondurant, 2001;Fisher et al, 2003;Kahn & Mathie, 2000;Layman et al, 1996;Littleton et al, 2009;McMullin & White, 2006). Conversely, women are less likely to label the incident as ''rape'' if it was perpetrated by a romantic partner (Kahn et al, 2003) or if they had been under the influence of alcohol during the experience (Botta & Pingree, 1997;Layman et al, 1996).…”

Section: Factors Associated With Labeling Incidents As Rapementioning

confidence: 99%

A Match-and-Motivation Model of How Women Label Their Nonconsensual Sexual Experiences

Peterson

Muehlenhard

2011

Psychology of Women Quarterly

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Many rape victims are unacknowledged rape victims-they report an experience meeting researchers' operational definitions of rape but do not label their experience as rape. The purpose of this study was to investigate women's decisions about whether to label their experiences as rape. Participants were 77 college women (predominantly White; mean age ¼ 19.23) who had experienced rape according to the study's operational definition.The researchers used open-ended questionnaires and interviews to explore participants' explanations for labeling or not labeling their experience as rape. Explanations were related to match-whether the incident matched their rape script (e.g., whether the man fit their image of a rapist; whether they fought back)-and to motivation-the perceived consequences of using the label (e.g., discomfort with thinking of the perpetrator as a rapist; feeling less self-blame vs. feeling less control or more traumatized). Over time, participants were more likely to label their experience as rape. Results suggested that individuals differ in the meanings that they ascribe to the label rape. For some individuals, labeling their experience as rape may be adaptive; for others, it may be unhelpful or even harmful. Researchers, clinicians, and advocates should use caution in imposing their own preferred labels on other women's experiences.

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Unacknowledged versus acknowledged rape victims: Situational factors and posttraumatic stress.

Cited by 138 publications

References 20 publications

Cross-sectional predictors of sexual assault perpetration in a community sample of single African American and Caucasian men

Cross-sectional predictors of sexual assault perpetration in a community sample of single African American and Caucasian men

Predictors of PTSD symptom severity and social reactions in sexual assault victims

A Match-and-Motivation Model of How Women Label Their Nonconsensual Sexual Experiences

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