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Cyber-sexual violence is a prevalent and harmful form of aggression committed against women, yet little attention has been paid to the attitudes about cyber-sexual violence. This research therefore aimed to explore the negative attitudes or myths that serve to justify, minimize, and deny the experiences of cyber-sexual violence disclosed by women on Twitter. Using a thematic analysis, we analyzed 4,048 replies to 18 experiences reported on Twitter around the time of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. After the data were cleaned and coded, the results revealed 18 myths about cyber-sexual violence, grouped into four main themes: (1) minimization/conceptualization, (2) victim blaming, (3) factors related to the diffusion context, and (4) exonerating the perpetrator's responsibility. This study constitutes the first attempt to analyze the myths surrounding cyber-sexual violence on Twitter, including content areas not yet addressed in the literature, such as contextual factors. Strikingly, most of the analyzed reactions appeared to deny and downplay the importance of sexually aggressive behaviors perpetrated against women online, suggesting that these beliefs could influence the underreporting of cyber-sexual violence. Based on these data, it was concluded that while Twitter can serve as a useful "loudspeaker" for victims, it is also a mechanism by which myths about cyber-sexual violence can be supported and disseminated. Finally, it highlights the importance to consider the influence of online cultural frame on the social perception of cyber-sexual violence and point out the specific beliefs that educators, researches and psychologist could work though psychoeducational programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sexism is an increasingly prevalent problem in the gaming community. However, until now, assessment instruments focused on the construct "sexism against women gamers" are lacking. We present an eight-item self-report scale: Sexism Against Women Gamers Scale (SAWGS). We studied the reliability and validity of the scores of Spanish and English versions across five independent samples (N = 2,437), with participants from Spain and the United States. Scores on both versions demonstrated high reliability, while exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses supported their unidimensional structure. The analysis established configural, metric, and scalar invariance across gender. SAWGS was invariant at the configural level across countries. SAWGS scores were independent of social desirability, positively correlated with myths about intimate-partner violence against women, sexism, and social dominance orientation, and correlated negatively with feminism. Using two fictitious scenarios of sexism in online gaming, we found that gamers with higher scores on SAWGS showed a greater tendency to downplay a sexist incident and proposed a less severe punishment for toxic gamers. The SAWGS explained additional variance on responses to scenarios beyond that explained by other measures. The detection of sexism should make it possible to develop programs for its eradication and avoid negative consequences for women gamers. Additional online materials for this article are available on PWQ's website at http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/suppl/10.1177/03616843231162837 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Exposure to sexist humor creates a context in which some men feel comfortable expressing aggressive tendencies toward women (i.e., self-reported rape proclivity). This is in part because this type of humor makes it easier for men who have antagonistic attitudes toward women to express their prejudice without fear of social reprisal. Besides, previous research has demonstrated the influence of motivational variables such as autonomy (initiation or regulation of intentional behavior based on free choice) and control (acting under external pressure) on aggression. We conducted two experiments to explore the hypothetical influence of priming autonomy and control motivations on the relation between sexist humor and the expression of sexually aggressive tendencies toward women. Study 1 (N = 108) revealed that control-primed men with high (vs. low) scores in hostile sexism reported a higher rape proclivity when exposed to sexist (vs. neutral) humor. These results were partially replicated in Study 2 (N = 132), assessing the accessibility of aggressive sexual thoughts. This research contributes to our understanding of the influence of sexist humor and motivational orientations in sexist men on the expression of aggressive sexual behaviors directed against women. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Three experiments examined the effect of sexist humor on men’s self-reported rape proclivity (RP). Pilot study demonstrated that people differentiate the five rape scenarios of Bohner et al.’s. RP Scale based on the degree of physical violence perpetrated against the victim. Experiment 1 demonstrated that men higher in hostile sexism report greater RP upon exposure to sexist jokes when a woman (vs. a man) delivers them, and that this effect is limited to rape scenarios depicting a moderate versus a high level of physical violence. Experiment 2 further demonstrated that the relationship between hostile sexism and rape proclivity in response to a moderately violent rape scenario after exposure to sexist humor generalizes beyond women in the immediate humor context to women as a whole. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We conducted two studies to investigate whether the degree to which people identify with women as a social category affects amusement with sexist humor (humor that disparages women) apart from their affective dispositions toward women. Both studies supported our hypothesis showing that male and female participants were more amused by sexist humor the less they identified with -- the more they felt psychologically distant from -- women as a social category. Study 2 further demonstrated that empathy with women as a social category was not related to amusement with sexist humor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In two studies, we analyzed the differences in the appreciation (i.e., funniness and aversiveness) and interpretation (i.e., criticism of sexism and woman and man disparagement) of subversive humor against sexism compared to sexist humor. In Study 1 (n = 202), we used a confirmatory factor analysis to verify the independence of subversive humor and sexist humor. The pattern of relations between feminist identity and the appreciation and interpretation of subversive humor against sexism was the opposite to that found between feminist identity and the appreciation and interpretation of sexist humor. The same happened with the relations between hostile sexism and subversive humor vs. sexist humor. In Study 2 (n = 169), we experimentally manipulated the type of humor. The pattern of interactions between type of humor and feminist identity was the opposite to that found between type of humor and hostile sexism. Both studies revealed that the appreciation of subversive humor was higher in more feminist participants but the appreciation of sexist humor was higher in more sexist participants. Participants with the highest levels of feminist identity and the lowest levels of hostile sexism perceived the greatest criticism of sexism in subversive humor and the highest woman disparagement in sexist humor. • CFA verified the factorial independence of feminist humor and sexist humor. • The appreciation of feminist humor was higher in more feminist participants. • The appreciation of sexist humor was higher in more sexist participants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]