Empathy for a Black Woman Victim of Police Sexual Violence: The Roles of Crime-Related Stress and Stereotype Attributions

Abstract

Police sexual violence has been ranked as the second most common form of misconduct among police officers. Moreover, there is evidence that Black women are at heightened risk of being victims of such police violence. A report titled Say Her Name: Resisting Police Brutality Against Black Women has brought international attention to the minimal empirical focus on such police violence toward Black women. To address this lacuna in the literature, using an incident of police sexual assault of a woman, we assessed whether victim’s race and participants’ level of crime-related stress (i.e., stress due to crime victimization) would influence empathic responding toward the victim. Prolific participants ( N = 411) first completed a measure of crime-related stress. They then read an article describing a White police officer’s sexual assault of a Black or White woman. Next, participants completed a racial stereotype-related measure (i.e., Black women’s higher sexual proclivity) and a stereotype-unrelated measure (i.e., perceived victim untrustworthiness), and reported their victim-directed empathic responding. At high stress levels, participants reported less empathy for the Black (relative to White) victim. At low stress levels, there was greater Black victim-directed empathy. The race effects on empathy were mediated by heightened attribution of Black women-related stereotypical beliefs to the Black victim at high stress levels and by diminished attribution at low stress levels. In sum, we addressed the lacuna in the literature on police sexual violence against Black women while providing evidence that stress can play a critical role in the occurrence of the oft-cited outgroup-directed empathy deficit.

When high right-wing authoritarians report elevated empathy toward a Black woman victim of police violence: “inclusive victimhood consciousness” from police mistreatment experiences.

“…In addition, right-wing ideological attitudes research has principally focused on how they predict aggressive attitudes and behaviors (Van Hiel et al, 2020). The present study contributes to the small but promising literature examining right-wing attitudes as a moderator variable in reactions to the aggressive behavior (J. Johnson et al, 2023).…”

“…The present study contributes to the small but promising literature examining right-wing attitudes as a moderator variable in reactions to the aggressive behavior (J. Johnson et al, 2023). Fourth, the current research involved the examination of factors that might heighten favorable and empathic reactions toward a Black woman victim of police violence.…”

“…Previous research in this area has tended to explore variables such as stress (J. Johnson et al, 2023) or sexism (Brown-Iannuzzi et al, 2022) that would diminish favorable reactions toward Black women victims. Indeed, we found that greater favorable reactions toward White versus Black women victims of police violence among those who report high levels of prejudice is not inevitable.…”

“…In one of the first studies of police nonlethal violence against Black (compared to White) women, Brown-Iannuzzi et al (2022) showed that individual differences in benevolent sexism among the participants played a substantial role in more favorable reactions toward the White woman relative to the Black woman victim. In addition, J. Johnson et al (2023) found that high emotional stress from experiencing crime victimization was linked to greater stereotypical attributions (i.e., promiscuity) and reduced empathy for a Black victim relative to a White victim of sexual assault by a White police officer.…”

“…In addition, J. Johnson et al (2023) found that high emotional stress from experiencing crime victimization was linked to greater stereotypical attributions (i.e., promiscuity) and reduced empathy for a Black victim relative to a White victim of sexual assault by a White police officer.…”