Rape Scripts of Low-income European American and Latina Women

Rape scripts can affect attributions about rape and recovery from rape. Due to the potential importance of these scripts, it is critical to investigate them among women of diverse backgrounds. In the current investigation, 393 low-income European American and Latina women completed a questionnaire regarding their ideas about a typical rape. Violence and negative psychological effects on the victim were rated as highly typical of rape. Latinas rated hook-up and date rapes and rapes among individuals in an established relationship as significantly less typical of rape than did European Americans. Latinas also rated the victim experiencing stigma as less typical than European Americans did. Implications of the results for future work on the scripts of individuals of different cultural backgrounds are discussed.