Peer modeling and college men's sexually impositional behavior in the laboratory

The purpose of this study was to examine the influence of peer modeling on sexually impositional behavior in the laboratory. Male participants with and without a self-reported history of sexually aggressive behavior viewed video clips depicting nonaggressive and sexually aggressive behavior and then chose one of the clips to show to a female confederate. Half of the participants were first exposed to a male confederate who showed the sexually aggressive video clip to a female confederate. The other half of the participants were exposed to a male confederate who showed a nonaggressive video clip to a female confederate. Exposure to a male confederate who showed a sexually aggressive video clip to a female was associated with participants' choosing to engage in this same behavior. A self-reported history of sexually aggressive behavior was also associated with participants' showing the sexually aggressive video clip in spite of believing the effect on the female viewer would be negative.