NCJ Number
89283
Journal
Criminal Justice Abstracts Dated: (March 1983) Pages: 100-112
Date Published
1983
Length
13 pages
Annotation
This review of literature on forcible rape identifies various theories on factors related to heterosexual rape behavior and victim response and notes research gaps.
Abstract
Some of the reports on forcible rape contain general remarks about the directions that should be pursued in future theorizing and research; for example, Chappell, Fogarty, Deming, and Eppy have sorted rape inquiries into (1) cross-cultural and macrolevel studies of forcible rape, (2) rape victimization and responses of rape victims, (3) causes of rape at the individual level, (4) variations in criminal justice processing of alleged rapists, and (5) reforms in rape laws and the impact of these reforms. Additionally, the literature includes observations about improvements needed in theorizing and research tools to be used in the study of rape. Research has tended to associate rape behavior with cultures or subcultures of violence and male dominance in interaction between sexes. Rapists have also been found to experience social powerlessness according to some research. An exemplary study is one by Williams and Holmes, where a San Antonio study of rape victims found that degrees of crisis response, degrees of change in feelings about men, and degrees of change in victims' usual style of functioning were significantly related to the race-ethnicity of the victim. A major research need is to identify various types of sexual behavior and relate them to the specifics of sexual learning or socialization that spawned them. Rape is a specific form of sexual behavior whose roots may be traced to certain types of sexual learning. Such explorations have been neglected in social-psychological research. Thirty-two footnotes are provided.