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Women’s representation in social media is becoming increasingly sexualized, even when they are victims of sexual harassment (SH). In the present research, we adopted a bystander approach to investigate the role of victims’ sexualization on bystanders’ reactions to an episode of SH. In Study 1, female participants read a fictitious newspaper article that described a workplace SH episode: According to condition, the article included a picture of the victim who was wearing either sexualized or nonsexualized clothing. In Study 2, which also included male participants, we used a similar procedure and measured a series of traditional beliefs against women equality. As predicted, participants showed lower willingness to help the sexualized than nonsexualized victim: This effect occurred because they attributed lower morality to the victim and blamed her more for the SH event. Study 2 very well replicated Study 1 results and also showed that higher levels of endorsement of traditional masculine norms further enhanced biased perception of the sexualized (vs. nonsexualized) victim. Together, findings suggest that biased evaluations of workplace SH episodes associated with sexualized victims’ appearance, consistent with traditional masculine norms, may have detrimental consequences by increasing legitimization and tolerance toward SH.

To test the “sex sells” assumption, we examined how Italian men and women react to sexualized advertising. Women showed lower product attractiveness and purchase intentions toward products presented with sexualized female models than with neutral ads, whereas men were unaffected by ads’ sexualization (Study 1,n = 251). Study 2 (n = 197) replicated the overall results. Study 3 (n = 198) tested hostile sexism as a moderator as well as negative emotions as a mediator of consumers’ responses. Especially men with higher hostile sexism showed more purchase intentions after viewing female sexualized ads than neutral ads. Moreover, women’s lower consumer responses toward sexualized female ads were due to higher negative emotions. Study 4 (n = 207) included ads with both female and male models, replicating responses to female sexualization and showing that both women and men had lower product attractiveness and purchase intentions toward male sexualized ads than neutral ads. Replicating and extending Study 3’s results, women’s negative emotions was the mediator. The present study has practical implications for marketers because it suggests that “sex does not sell.” In addition, considering both the psychological damage and practical inefficacy of sexualized ads, our findings have important implications for public policy.

This paper examines the influence of female sexualization on people's willingness to provide help in cases of intimate partner violence (IPV). We examined how sexualization may make women seem lacking moral patiency and moral virtue both of which may lead to a reduced willingness to help. In the first study, participants read a fictitious newspaper article describing an IPV incident. They were then presented with a picture of the ostensible victim depicting the woman with either a sexualized or non-sexualized appearance. Participants judged both the victim's moral patiency and morality, and then expressed their willingness to provide help to that victim. Although the sexualized victim was viewed as a lesser moral patient (Studies 1 and 2) and as less moral (Study 2), it was seeing the victim as unworthy of moral patiency rather than lacking moral virtue (immoral) that linked sexualization to reduced help. Controlling for participants' sexism and women's admission of infidelity, Study 2 replicated that sexualization reduced helping intentions through a lack of moral patiency. Practical implications are discussed. Language: en