RESPONDING TO SEXUAL DISCRIMINATION - THE EFFECTS OF SOCIETAL VERSUS SELF-BLAME

Although self-blame has been considered to be a useful coping tool for victims, its benefits within the context of group discrimination are equivocal. The present research hypothesized that women encouraged to engage in self-blame for sex discrimination would be more likely to en dorse accepting the situation or to endorse the use of individual, nor mative actions. In contrast, women encouraged to engaged in societal b lame for sex discrimination would be more likely to participate in non mormative actions aimed at enhancing the status of women as a group. F emale students in Canada were subjected to a situation of discriminati on and were encouraged to blame either themselves or society. They wer e then given the opportunity to respond to the discrimination by endor sing various actions. A profile analysis of the endorsed actions indic ated that the women encouraged to blame themselves were most likely to endorse accepting the situation, whereas the women encouraged to blam e society endorsed nonnormative individual confrontation.