Gerd Bohner

Perceptions of stranger and acquaintance rape: The role of benevolent and hostile sexism in victim blame and rape proclivity.

In Studies 1 and 2, after reading an acquaintance-rape but not a stranger-rape scenario, higher benevolent sexist but not hostile sexist participants blamed the victim significantly more. In Study 2, higher hostile sexist but not benevolent sexist male participants showed significantly greater proclivity to commit acquaintance (but not stranger) rape. Studies 3 and 4 supported the hypothesis that the effects of benevolent sexism and hostile sexism are mediated by different perceptions of the victim, as behaving inappropriately and as really wanting sex with the rapist. These findings show that benevolent sexism and hostile sexism underpin different assumptions about women that generate sexist reactions toward rape victims.

Rape myths as neutralizing cognitions: evidence for a causal impact of anti-victim attitudes on men's self-reported likelihood of raping

Mens rape myth acceptance (RMA; prejudiced beliefs that serve to exonerate the rapist and blame the victim) has been shown to correlate positively with self-reported rape proclivity (RP). To explore the causal pathway underlying this correlation, two experiments were conducted in which the relative cognitive accessibility of RMA and RP was varied. Male students were asked to report their RP in the context of a scale assessing attraction toward sexual aggression (Experiment 1) or in response to five realistic date-rape scenarios (Experiment 2), either before or after they filled out a 20-item RMA scale. In both studies, the correlation of RMA and RP was significantly greater in the after than in the before condition, suggesting that the belief in rape myths has a causal influence on mens proclivity to rape.

There are many reasons to drive a BMW: Does imagined ease of argument generation influence attitudes?

The effects of imagined versus actual ease of self-generating product-related information were investigated. An ad invited recipients to name either one reason or 10 reasons for (against) choosing a BMW over a Mercedes. Participants who complied with the task experienced the retrieval of one reason as easier than the retrieval of 10 reasons. Participants who did not comply nevertheless imagined the former as easier than the latter. Independent of whether ease was actually experienced or merely imagined, participants evaluated BMW more (less) favorably and Mercedes less (more) favorably when the retrieval was easy rather than difficult.

Social Norms and the Likelihood of Raping: Perceived Rape Myth Acceptance of Others Affects Men's Rape Proclivity

Research showing that rape myth acceptance (RMA) causally affects rape proclivity (RP) was extended by examining the impact of RMA-related norms on RP. Male students (total N = 264) received feedback about the alleged responses of other students to RMAitems either before (Experiment 1) or after (Experiment 2) they reported their own RMA, and then their RP was assessed using acquaintance-rape scenarios. The level of RMA feedback was varied. Results showed that higher norms led to higher RP. In Experiment 1, this effect was mediated via selfreported RMA. Experiment 2 yielded main effects of both RMA feedback and self-reported RMA and an interaction effect showing that RMA feedback was particularly influential at higher levels of own RMA. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.

The interplay of heuristic and systematic processing of social information.

The heuristic-systematic model (HSM) provides a general theory of social information processing. It features two modes of social information processing, a relatively effortless, top-down heuristic mode and a more effortful, bottom-up systematic mode. The model assumes that social perceivers strike a balance between effort minimization and achieving confidence in their social judgments. The HSM emphasizes three broad motivational forces: accuracy, defence, and impression motivation. Both heuristic and systematic processing can serve either of the three motives and are capable of co-occurring in an additive or interactive fashion under specified conditions. In this chapter, we describe the HSM and present illustrative research based on the model in the areas of mood and persuasion as well as minority influence.

Accuracy Motivation, Consensus Information, and the Law of Large Numbers: Effects on Attitude Judgment in the Absence of Argumentation

This study examined the influence of majority opinion on attitudes in the absence of persuasive argumentation. Participants who were either high or low in accuracy motivation were presented with an opinion poll that conveyed consensus information and the sample size of the poll. According to the law of large numbers (LLN), large polls provide more reliable estimates of consensus than smaller polls. Results generally supported predictions. Less-motivated participants tended to be influenced by consensus regardless of poll size, whereas highly motivated participants based attitudes on this information only if the poll was reliably large. Thus, participants who were highly motivated seemed to appreciate the LLN when making their attitude judgments. Consistent with the heuristic-systematic model, process measures indicated that consensus influenced attitudes through both heuristic and biased systematic processing under high motivation, but it influenced attitudes only via heuristic processing when motivation was low.

Beyond Conflict and Discrepancy: Cognitive Bias in Minority and Majority Influence

The authors studied effects of majority and minority support on persuasion for nondiscrepant positions. In two experiments, students (N = 188) read messages on previously unknown attitude objects. These messages were attributed to numerical majorities (high consensus) or minorities (low consensus). The results show that consensus information can bias systematic processing of message content. High consensus evoked positively biased cognitive responses that focused on message content (convergent processing), whereas low consensus elicited negatively biased processing that pertained to new aspects of the issue (divergent processing). Post-message attitudes were more positive under high consensus than under low consensus; this effect was mediated via thought valence but not via thought convergence. In Experiment 2, these effects were replicated if consensus information preceded message processing but not if it was presented after message processing. Furthermore, in both experiments, cognitive activity was lower if consensus information was presented (vs. not presented) before the message.

Rape Myth Acceptance and Rape Proclivity: Expected Dominance Versus Expected Arousal as Mediators in Acquaintance-Rape Situations.

Individuals who are high in rape myth acceptance (RMA) have been found to report a high proclivity to rape. In a series of three studies, the authors examined whether the relationship between RMA and self-reported rape proclivity was mediated by anticipated sexual arousal or anticipated enjoyment of sexually dominating the rape victim. Results of all three studies suggest that the anticipated enjoyment of sexual dominance mediates the relationship between RMA and rape proclivity, whereas anticipated sexual arousal does not. These findings are consistent with the feminist argument that rape and sexual violence may be motivated by men’s desire to exert power over women. Theoretical and practical implications of our findings are discussed.

When Small Means Comfortable: Relations Between Product Attributes in Two-sided Advertising

The processes that mediate the effectiveness of 2-sided advertising were studied. We predicted that (a) 2-sided (vs. 1-sided) advertisements increase perceived source credibility and that (b) the logical relation between the negative and positive product attributes mentioned in the 2-sided ad (e.g., little space, implying a cozy atmosphere) facilitates favorable inferences about the positive attributes, especially when recipients have sufficient time to process the message content. Results supported these predictions. However, the effects of message type and processing time on attitudes were mediated by inferences about positive attributes but not by perceived source credibility. Implications of these findings for consumer judgment and decision making are discussed.

Writing about rape: Use of the passive voice and other distancing text features as an expression of perceived responsibility of the victim

The hypothesis that the passive voice is used to put the actor in the background and the acted-upon person in the focus of discourse is tested in the realm of sexual violence. German university students (N = 67) watched a silent video segment depicting a rape whose circumstances, depending on condition, could or could not be easily interpreted in terms of rape myths. Then they wrote down what they had seen, judged the responsibility of assailant and victim, and completed a rape-myth acceptance scale. Participants used the passive voice more frequently to describe the rape itself vs. other actions they had watched. When circumstances of the rape were easily interpretable in terms of rape myths, use of the passive voice correlated positively with rape-myth acceptance and perceived responsibility of the victim, and negatively with perceived responsibility of the assailant. The language of headlines that participants generated for their reports also reflected judgments of assailant and victim responsibility. Implications for the non-reactive assessment of responsibility attributions and directions for future research are discussed.