Abuse in Sports: The Influence of Victim Gender, Defendant Gender, and Type of Abuse

The current study sought to examine whether defendant gender, victim gender, and type of abuse (emotional, physical) impacted mock jurors' judgments when the abuse happened within a sports context. Participants (N = 239) read a mock case vignette describing the alleged abuse. They then were asked whether the case should proceed to trial, rate their perceptions of the defendant, rate their perceptions of the victim, and answer questions related to sexism. Overall, there was a main effect of type of abuse with participants agreeing it should proceed to trial and having more positive perceptions of the defendant when the abuse was physical. Victims were perceived less favorably when the alleged abuse was emotional. The results of the study concluded that while gender has little influence, type of abuse is greatly influential. Furthermore, the results suggested that participants believed it was more common for male coaches to emotionally abuse female athletes and female coaches to emotionally abuse male athletes. These results give insight into the relationship between the public perceptions of gender and abuse in sports.