Sexual Abuse Prevention With High-Risk Males: The Roles of Victim Empathy and Rape Myths

Abstract

The outcome of two sexual abuse prevention programs, one emphasizing victim empathy and the other stressing modifying rape myths, was evaluated with high-risk males. Sixty-eight high-risk males, as determined by self-reported likelihood of committing sexual abuse, were randomly assigned to an empathy-treatment, a facts-treatment, or a no-treatment control group. Treatment effects were assessed using subjects' pre- and post-treatment scores on the Likelihood of Sexually Abusing scale, the Rape Empathy Scale, the Acceptance of Interpersonal Violence scale, the Adversarial Sexual Beliefs Scale, and a test of self-reported sexual arousal to forced versus consenting sex. In addition, posttest scores on an Asch-type conformity measure were obtained. Results of validity checks indicated that high-risk subjects differed from low-risk subjects on a number of rape-related variables, that the victim-empathy condition increased subjects' empathy, and that subjects found both treatments to be credible and helpful. Comparisons between the empathy-, facts-, and no-treatment group contraindicated the practice of dispelling rape myths as a method of preventing rape among high-risk males.