Childhood Sexual Abuse: Attribution of Responsibility

Attribution theory is used to address a disparity between the number of male victims of child sexual abuse reported in clinical samples versus those reported in community samples. Participants were 48 female and 48 male undergraduate students. Participants were asked to read a vignette of a 25 year old male/female having sex with a 13 year old male/female. Two settings were used in the vignettes. The incident occurred at the victims home in half the vignettes and at a party in the other half. Participants completed an attributional questionnaire and a demographic questionnaire. Results indicate that female respondents considered the abuse more serious when the perpetrator was a male and the victim was a female. Male respondents considered the scenario more offensive when the perpetrator was male and the victim was male. Male respondents found the incident less offensive when the perpetrator was female and the victim was male. Female respondents found the scenario more offensive when the incident occurred in the victims own home while male respondents found the scenario more abusive if it occurred at a party. Respondents who reported a previous experience in an abusive relationship considered the incident significantly more serious than did respondents who did not report a history of abusive relationships. Respondents felt that female victims should be better able to prevent the incident. Respondents tended to feel the victim should have prevented the incident when the perpetrator was female and the incident occurred at home or when the perpetrator was male and the incident occurred at a party. It is suggested that future research should continue to focus on why male victims are not as likely to receive treatment as female victims.