Views of sexual assault following #MeToo The role of gender and individual differences

One way social movements can achieve change is through impacting public opinion, yet research testing effects of real-world collective action is scarce. In this research, we investigated both short and long-term impact of #MeToo, a global social media movement. We tracked changes in dismissal of sexual assault with self-report surveys among US participants recruited online across four waves of measurement (initial N ≈ 500): twice before #MeToo movement, at the peak of the #MeToo, and six-months later. We investigated whose attitudes will be most or least affected by the movement by considering individual differences pertaining to gender, gender and feminist identification, and social dominance orientation (SDO). Overall, dismissal of sexual assault reduced following #MeToo among both men and women, and this change persisted six-months later. This effect was moderated by SDO such that low-SDO men and high-SDO women showed the most reduction in dismissal of sexual assault. We did not find a backlash effect as would be suggested by prior work, or by vocal criticism of #MeToo. Potential explanation for SDO's unique influence and implication for social change efforts are discussed.