Citation

Osman SL, Orth RL. Violence Gend. 2017; 4(1): 25-26.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2017, Mary Ann Liebert Publishers)

DOI

10.1089/vio.2016.0017

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine empathy with a hypothetical rapist based on type of sexual perpetration experience (i.e., none, nonrape perpetrators, rapists who do not admit to "rape," and rapists who admit to "rape"). Undergraduate men (n = 385) completed the Rape-Perpetrator Empathy Scale (Smith and Frieze 2003) and the Sexual Experiences Survey-Short Form Perpetration (Koss et al. 2007), which first asks behavior-based questions, without using the word "rape," to identify rapists and those with other sexual perpetration experience, and then asks if they "may have ever raped someone." None of the respondents admitted to "rape," but participants whose survey responses indicated prior behavior consistent with rape (rapists) reported greater empathy than those who indicated no behaviors consistent with any type of sexual perpetration (nonperpetrators). Respondents who indicated prior behavior consistent with sexual perpetration, but not rape (nonrape perpetrators) did not differ from either rapists or nonperpetrators. Committing rape may be associated with greater rape perpetrator empathy due to similarity in experience.

Language: en