Exploring Rape Myth Acceptance and Psychopathy as Predictors of Sexual Coercion

ABSTRACT

Evidence suggests certain psychological traits and inaccurate cognitions or beliefs are important predictors of sexual coercion. While research has demonstrated that psychopathic traits are one of the best sexual aggression predictors, research has also shown the importance of rape myth acceptance as a predictor. Although both constructs have significant evidence supporting their predictive power with sexual coercion, some recent research has found that the relationship between rape myth acceptance and sexual coercive tactics was negated with the addition of psychopathy scores. The current study seeks to extend this previous researchby using a larger sample of college males (N = 481), different measures of rape myth acceptance and psychopathy, and both retrospective and prospective methods. The results of the current study partially support previous findings, but also demonstrate differences in the predictive utility of rape myth acceptance and psychopathy constructs in the prospective prediction. Both psychopathy, particularly callousness, and rape myth acceptance were significant predictors of the sample’s intention of using both verbal and illegal sexual coercive tactics.

KEYWORDS:

• Sexual coercion
• psychopathy
• rape myth acceptance

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Ethical Standards and Informed Consent

All the procedures followed were in accordance with the ethical standards of the responsible committee on human experimentation [institutional and national] and with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975, as revised in 2000. Informed consent was obtained from all participants for being included in the study.”