| Abstract: | In order to assess the effects of socialdesirability on (1) reported gender-role ideology and(2) the relative acceptance of rape myths, a shortsocial desirability (SD) scale was integrated into aquestionnaire containing items from both attitude sets.Participants were 160 university students. Less than 5%of the sample was of other than European ethnicity. Agender by SD interaction was predicted, wherein high SD would predict more feminist beliefs for men;the relationship was expected to be less strong forwomen. Although a significant gender by SD interactionwas found, the pattern of results was unexpected. SD did not predict attitudes for men, and womenwho were high in SD actually reported more traditionalgender-role attitudes and were more accepting of rapemyths than women lower in SD. Interpretations and implications of these unexpected findingsare discussed. |
