Abstract
The effects of gender of victim and offender, age of victim, and initiator of interaction (victim or offender) on the general public'sperceptions of, and judgments about, cases of child sexual assault, were investigated in two experiments conducted at the Ontario Science Centre, using a total of 282 adult volunteer subjects. In Experiment 1, subjects were presented with brief descriptions of a case of child sexual assault, and responded to a series of questions regarding the scenario. The gender of the victim and offender, and the identity of the initiating party, were manipulated in a 2 x 2 x 2 fullycrossed design. In Experiment 2, subjects were administered a similar procedure, with the age of the victim and the identity of the initiating party manipulated. In both experiments, the manipulation of the identity of the initiating party was found to have the strongest and most consistent effects. Implications of these findings regarding reporting biases, and legal and clinical decision-making are discussed.
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