Researchers have used many techniques to measure attitudes about rape and rape victims, such as questionnaires, written vignettes, mock trials, videotaped scenarios, still photography, and newspaper reports. Gender research has found that overall, men are less empathetic and sensitive than women toward rape, and they attribute more responsibility to the victim (Nagel et al., 2005; B. H. White & Kurpius, 2002; Workman & Freeburg, 1999). Men believe more rape myths (see the footnote about Burt’s 1980 research on page 570), and they also believe that a woman is signaling sexual availability when the woman thinks her behavior is simply friendly or even neutral (B. E. Johnson et al., 1997; Saal et al., 1989). Women rate a rape as more justified and see the victim as more responsible for the rape when the woman was seen as “leading a man on” (Muehlenhard & MacNaughton, 1988). Some women believe that if they “led a man on,” they gave up their right to refuse sex (Muehlenhard & Schrag, 1991).
However, there is some hope in changing these attitudes about rape. One longitudinal study found that all men experienced a decline in negative rape attitudes over the
4 years they were in college (Pamm, 2001). This may be due in part to rape education workshops, which have been found to decrease rape myths (Klaw et al., 2005).