| The present research examines the impact of people's expectations regarding appropriate gender norms for women and a complainant's ethnicity on their evaluations of a sexual assault. Participants (N=263) read an acquaintance rape scenario in which the complainant was portrayed as either an active initiator of contact with the defendant (gender stereotypic condition) or as a passive recipient of the contact initiated by the defendant (gender counter-stereotypic condition). Furthermore, the complainant was presented as a White, East Asian, or South Asian woman. The analyses conducted on 165 participants demonstrated that when the complainant was presented as following traditional gender roles she was evaluated less harshly, whereas the defendant was evaluated more harshly. When the complainant's behaviour violated these roles the results appeared to be reversed. Moreover, when the complainant was White, she was evaluated more harshly than when she was ethnic, especially when she was conforming to traditional gender roles. |
