Date Approved
4-2021
Graduate Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Criminal Justice (M.S.)
Degree Program
School of Criminal Justice
First Advisor
Dr. Tonisha Jones
Second Advisor
Dr. Jina Lee
Third Advisor
Dr. Christina Yalda
Academic Year
2020/2021
Abstract
Rape myths, and the acceptance of these rape myths, have been studied extensively for the last several decades. Since the 1980s, researchers have used various rape myth acceptance (RMA) scalesRape Myth Acceptance Scale (Burt 1980), the Illinois Rape Myth Acceptance Scale (Payne et al., 1999), and the Updated Illinois Rape Myth Acceptance Scale (McMahon & Farmer, 2011)-to examine whether certain factors (e.g., gender, just world beliefs, gender norm conformity, and police officer bias) influence individual RMA levels. Little to no research has explored how gendered pronouns used in these scales influence the levels of RMA measured. This study seeks to fill that gap, to examine whether the use of gendered pronouns (he, she, his, her, etc.) influences measured RMA levels. A total of 3,500 undergraduate students from Grand Valley State University were recruited via their Grand Valley student email and a total of 728 responded. Participants completed either the Updated IRMA or the Revised Updated IRMA (created for this study), where the gendered pronouns (he, she, his, her, etc.) were removed from the scale items. A total of 567 participants provided usable data. Findings for three out of 22 scale questions were significant. Statistical significance was found for the variable “Sexually Carried Away” on the Revised IRMA (p=.032), demonstrating that those presented with the revised scale demonstrated less rape myth acceptance than those presented with the Updated IRMA (McMahon & Farmer, 2011) version. Statistical significance also was found for the variable “Fight Back” (p=.038) and variable “Emotional Problems” (p=.056) on the Updated IRMA scale demonstrating that those presented with the Updated IRMA demonstrated less rape myth acceptance towards this myth than those presented with the Revised Updated IRMA. This initial effort to examine the influence of gendered pronouns on RMA measurement tools raises questions about their continued use and suggests the need for further research.
ScholarWorks Citation
Merritt, Cassandra M., "Gendered Pronouns and Rape Myth Acceptance" (2021). Masters Theses. 1016.
https://scholarworks.gvsu.edu/theses/1016
