Student judgments about dating violence: A factorial vignette analysis

Survey vignette methodology was employed to investigate student beliefs abo ut what constitutes abusive behaviors in dating relationships. A packet of 15 unique vignettes depicting incidents that might be considered to be viol ent was distributed to randomly selected graduate and undergraduate student s who were asked to rate physical abusiveness. Based on multiple regression analysis, both contextual and student demographic characteristics were fou nd to influence abusiveness ratings. Significant predictors of abuse judgme nts were nature of the aggressive act and victim's gender and sexual orient ation. Moro severe acts of aggression, female victims, gay and lesbian vict ims, a history of violence in the relationship, injurious outcome, male per petrator, and alcohol consumption significantly increased abusiveness ratin gs. More advanced students and female students tended to make higher abuse ratings, whereas being in a relationship was associated with lower ratings. Although both contextual and demographic factors affected student judgment s of abusiveness, student characteristics explained relatively little beyon d what was accounted for by situational variables in the scenarios depicted .