From Attire to Assault: Clothing, Objectification, and De-humanization – A Possible Prelude to Sexual Violence?
In the context of objectification and violence, little attention has been paid to the perception neuroscience of how the human brain perceives bodies and objectifies them. Various studies point to how external cues such as appearance and attire could play a key role in encouraging objectification, dehumanization and the denial of agency.
Reviewing new experimental findings across several areas of research, it seems that common threads run through issues of clothing, sexual objectification, body perception, dehumanization, and assault.
Collating findings from several different lines of research, this article reviews additional evidence from cognitive and neural dynamics of person perception (body and face perception processes) that predict downstream social behavior. Specifically, new findings demonstrate cognitive processing of sexualized female bodies as object-like, a crucial aspect of dehumanized percept devoid of agency and personhood.
Sexual violence is a consequence of a dehumanized perception of female bodies that aggressors acquire through their exposure and interpretation of objectified body images. Integrating these findings and identifying triggers for sexual violence may help develop remedial measures and inform law enforcement processes and policy makers alike.
A myriad of issues in body and object perception, agency attribution and de-humanization highlight the centrality of psychological science in understanding how individuals become involved in violence, particularly sexual violence, in human society. In the recent past, several editorial and opinion articles published in popular news media have discussed the issue of sexual assault in the context of clothing and women’s attire.
When a series of articles open up to public discourse the question of how women’s attire is relevant to sexual assault, it seems pertinent to go a step further and examine the neuroscientific research on body perception and objectification. This is especially important when there is a relative paucity of research connecting the dots to offer a thoughtful and comprehensive framework within which to examine the issue.
A number of studies have examined the objectification of bodies in the context of whether they were covered or uncovered. It was found that when wearing underwear or a swimsuit, a person could be viewed as a mere body that exists for the pleasure and use of others (Bartky, 1990).
Sexual objectification has been related to decreased mind attribution (Loughnan et al., 2010) and diminished agency perception (Cikara et al., 2011). Sexualized women are perceived as less competent and less fully human (Vaes et al., 2011).
A focus on appearance rather than on personality diminished the degree of human nature attributed to females (Heflick and Goldenberg, 2009). The recognition and attribution of human nature is key to social perception, allowing people to differentiate humans from objects (Loughnan and Haslam, 2007).
However, it is not only men who dehumanize sexualized women and their representations. Widespread beliefs that women are sex objects are shared by both men and women at a basic cognitive level (Gervais et al., 2011, 2012; see also Heflick et al., 2011).
When women sexualize their appearance, they are at a far greater risk than men. A focus on appearance, instead of personality, increased the objectifying gaze toward women, as demonstrated by increased eye movements toward their chests and waists compared to their faces (Gervais et al., 2013b).
Through a series of experiments, Vaes et al. (2011) demonstrate that only objectified women were associated with less human concepts. The authors further show that sexually objectified women shift a man’s focus toward a female target, away from her personality and more onto her body, triggering a dehumanization process. In contrast, women dehumanize sexually objectified women by distancing themselves from the sexualized representations of their own gender category.
Another recent study points out that the perception of sexualized women deploys cognitive mechanisms specific to object perception, while sexualized men are perceived as persons (Bernard et al., 2012; also see Bernard et al., 2013; Tarr, 2013; Schmidt and Kistemaker, 2015). Specifically, Bernard et al. (2012) showed that sexualized female bodies are perceived as objects.
Consequences of Dehumanization: Prelude to Violence
As stated earlier, humans are distinguished from animals on attributes involving cognitive capacity, civility, and refinement, as well as from inanimate objects on the basis of emotionality, vitality, and warmth (Haslam and Loughnan, 2014).
Contrary to the belief that everyday forms of dehumanization are innocent and inconsequential, Kristoff (2014) has argued that the evidence reveals profoundly negative consequences for both victims and perpetrators. Dehumanization, the denial of agency and personhood contributes to large-scale intergroup conflict and violence (Haslam and Loughnan, 2014; Waytz et al., 2014). Dehumanization as a consequence of sexual objectification has dire consequences. Loughnan and Pacilli (2014) distinguish the consequences of objectification along the attitude/behavior distinction, highlighting an important aspect that has received less research attention.
On the attitudinal front, sexually objectified humans are likened to objects or automata with no capacity for qualities such as warmth, emotion, and individuality (Haslam, 2006). Cikara et al. (2011) report that viewing sexualized images of women reduced brain activation in areas for mental state attribution, while Vaes et al. (2011) showed that sexualized women are implicitly associated with animals by both male and female perceivers.
Milburn et al. (2000) examined perceptions of rape in an ethnically and socioeconomically diverse sample. The authors reported that those males who viewed sexually objectifying R-rated films reported diminished view of the victim’s suffering and thought the victim deserved sexual assault. In a sexually objectified context, the target’s clothing increased victim blaming and lower moral concern (Workman and Freeburg, 1999; Grubb and Harrower, 2009) in an acquaintance rape circumstance (Loughnan et al., 2013), highlighting animalization and infra-humanization as a result of clothing and objectification.
Another recent study examining the influence of sexual objectification on men and women’s rape perceptions, Bernard et al. (2015b) show that sexual objectification increased victim blaming and diminished rapist blame in cases of stranger rape. Both objectification and infra-humanisation make women vulnerable to violence. Similarly, research literature on the topic has established the sexualisation-to-meat link (Adams, 1990) wherein the denial of emotionality and agency reduces animals to meat producing units.
The capacity of the animal to suffer is perceived to be significantly less when the animal is perceived as food (Bratanova et al., 2011). Cruelty laws are differentially applied to pet and farm animals due to this distinction. Bongiorno et al. (2013) have argued that objectification results in reduction of human attributes to sexualised women and experimentally demonstrated that using sexualized images of women reduces support for ethical campaigns.
On the behavioral side, a number of studies (Bargh et al., 1995; Mussweiler and Förster, 2000; Landau et al., 2004; Gruenfeld et al., 2008) describe a complex interplay between power, sex, and aggression that might lead to violence toward presumed sexually appealing and available women. Some early research has shown that objectified women are subject to sexual harassment, sexual coercion and unwanted sexual attention (Fitzgerald et al., 1988), especially following exposure to objectifying media (Rudman and Borgida, 1995; Galdi et al., 2014) in public spaces by strangers (Fairchild and Rudman, 2008).
Men with hostile and aggressive views toward women are more likely to objectify. Further, attribution of animalistic lack of agency and reduced pain attribution results in higher likelihood of violence toward objectified targets. Rudman and Mescher (2012) demonstrate that men who implicitly associate women with animals and objects have a higher propensity for sexual aggression. Figueredo (1992) and Thornhill and Palmer (2000) have argued that males who commit rape are likely to have psychopathologies, social inadequacies, experience of childhood sexual trauma, lack of social competence and empathy (Stermac and Quinsey, 1986; Lipton et al., 1987; Lalumière et al., 2005). Sexual assaulters are similar to other violent offenders and tend to have extensive non-sexual criminal histories. Examining the impact of objectification in the domain of sexual assault, Loughnan et al. (2013) found that an objectified woman is blamed herself for being raped and is perceived to suffer less.
Dehumanization also underlies maltreatment and violence toward ethnic or racial minorities and animals. Reduced mind-attribution (as a result of dehumanization) makes it easier for the perpetrator to deny pain and agency to the dehumanized group. Research findings describe increased violent behavior, harsh treatment and reduced empathetic concern toward dehumanized targets (Zebel et al., 2008; Cehajic et al., 2009; Viki et al., 2013).
It seems predictable that sexual violence is a consequence of a dehumanized perception, particularly of female bodies and a generalized antisocial trait that aggressors acquire through their exposure and interpretation of body images. Providing additional evidence for the mediating role of objectification in sexual violence, Gervais et al. (2014) report that heavy drinking was associated positively with sexual objectification and sexual violence perpetrated by men.
Highlighting the sexual signaling function of clothing, Jeffreys (2005) points out that female clothing items also emphasize women as sexual objects aligned to male desires. Goodin et al. (2011) describe for instance, a man’s professional attire (generally a suit) disguises his underlying body shape, while a woman’s professional attire comprises a more form-fitting suit with a skirt that shows her legs, accompanied by high-heeled shoes.
Women in provocative clothing are rated s more flirtatious, seductive, promiscuous, and sexually experienced—and as less strong, determined, intelligent, and self-respecting (Koukounas and Letch, 2001; Gurung and Chrouser, 2007), emphasizing sexual availability and objectification. In contrast, Dunkel et al. (2010) demonstrate that young Muslim-American women wearing non-Western clothing and a head veil report significantly less pressure to attain the Western ideals of thin beauty, as compared to Muslim-American and non-Muslim women who wore Western-style clothing. Lahsaeizadeh and Yousefinejad (2012) describe the crucial interplay of attire in social contexts that determine the sexual harassment of women in public places.
pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5344900/