Disclosure of Sexual Assault in Entertainment Media: Adolescent Girls' Sense-making of Supportive and Unsupportive Sexual Assault Disclosure Narratives

This chapter explores how exposure to sexual assault victimization narratives in popular media can influence adolescent girls’ ability to understand sexual assault and imagine whether they would share a similar story, should they be in the protagonists’ place. Using an experimental design, the authors examined whether viewing a sexual assault victimization narrative that was supportive or unsupportive, in comparison to a control, impacted teen girls’ self-efficacy for sharing such a story. Findings provide some evidence that watching such narratives can influence sensemaking, and that stories that are negatively framed may negatively impact adolescent girls’ self-efficacy in sharing such a story.