Undergraduate students' perceptions of child sexual abuse: effects of age, sex, and gender-role attitudes.

OBJECTIVE The present study examined how sex of the child and the adult and age of the child influence perceptions regarding the abusiveness of adult-child sexual interactions and attributions of blame and responsibility to the adult in such incidents. The relationship of gender-role attitudes to perceptions of child sexual abuse was also investigated. METHOD Undergraduate students (N = 404) read one of eight vignettes depicting a sexual interaction between a child and an adult in which sex of the child, age of the child, and sex of the adult were manipulated. Respondents then answered questions regarding their perceptions of the abusiveness of the incident and attributions of responsibility and blame to the adult. RESULTS Scenarios depicting a 15-year-old were rated as less abusive, and less responsibility was attributed to the adult, relative to vignettes involving a 7-year-old. Respondents also rated scenarios depicting opposite-sex interactions as less abusive relative to scenarios describing same-sex interactions. When vignettes depicted a 15-year-old, less blame was attributed to the adult relative to when vignettes depicted a 7-year-old with an adult of either sex, with the least amount of blame being attributed to the adult involved with an adolescent of the opposite-sex. Gender-role attitudes were not significantly related to ratings of abusiveness or attributions of responsibility and blame. CONCLUSIONS These findings suggest that age of the child may influence ratings of abusiveness and attributions of responsibility and blame. Ratings of abusiveness and attributions of blame also appear to be influenced by the sex pairing in the interaction.