Sexual coercion in romantic relationships is a facet of criminal behaviour requiring psychological investigation. The cuckoldry risk hypothesis, that sexual coercion is a tactic used by some males to reduce the risk of cuckoldry by engaging in sperm competition, was developed to account for such behaviour. From this hypothesis, four predictions were generated and empirically tested: (1) males should be more willing to use sexually coercive tactics when the risk of cuckoldry is high; (2) greater instances of cuckoldry risk in the past should be related to greater instances of sexual aggression; (3) cuckoldry risk and sexual jealousy should positively correlate in men; and (4) among males, rape attitudes and arousal are highest when the risk of cuckoldry is high. Theoretical considerations also suggested the following exploratory questions: (1) are factors currently known to be related to general sexual coercion also related to measures of coercion in romantic relationships; and (2) can the cuckoldry risk measures still predict coercion after controlling for psychopathy? In order to test these predictions, a sample of 82 male and 82 female undergraduate students who were sexually active in a heterosexual relationship completed a survey that collected information on demographics, relationship characteristics, arousal, antisociality, and attitudes. Results found: (1) a significant interaction between cuckoldry risk variables in predicting coercion among male participants and not among females; (2) no relationship between past instances of cuckoldry risk and instances of sexual aggression; (3) those who spend proportionally less time away from their partner were more likely to score higher on sexual jealousy; (4) significant interactions in the anticipated direction were found when predicting scores on the Rape Empathy Scale and Rape Myth Acceptance Scale, a trend in the anticipated direction was found when predicting Adversarial Sexual Beliefs, and nonsignificant results were found when predicting Attraction to Sexual Aggression. Results addressing the exploratory questions found that: (1) only psychopathy significantly predicted partner sexual coercion; and (2) cuckoldry risk variables predicted sexual coercion after controlling for psychopathy. Discussion of these results cover: the importance of finding a sex difference; understanding the interaction between variables; how cuckoldry risk impacts rape-supportive thoughts, attitudes, and arousal; the role of sexual jealousy; the function of a cuckoldry risk psychological mechanism; and lastly, the implications on dynamic risk prediction.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:USASK/oai:usask.ca:etd-10222004-091759 |
| Date | 22 October 2004 |
| Creators | Camilleri, Joseph Anthony |
| Contributors | Wong, Stephen C. P., Elias, Lorin J., Dwyer, Philip, Campbell, J. I. D. (Jamie), Wormith, J. Stephen |
| Publisher | University of Saskatchewan |
| Source Sets | University of Saskatchewan Library |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://library.usask.ca/theses/available/etd-10222004-091759/ |
| Rights | unrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to University of Saskatchewan or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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