Do gender prototypes influence attorney willingness to represent sexual harassment victims?

When women make sexual harassment claims, those who deviate from (vs. conform to) gender prototypes are viewed as less credible, their experiences are minimized, and they receive less support. We explored whether this prototype bias affects attorneys' willingness to represent nonprototypical claimants, beliefs about settlement success, and perceptions of case merit.

We hypothesized that attorneys exposed to a gender nonprototypical (vs. prototypical) woman claimant would perceive her claim as less desirable to represent, as less deserving of financial compensation, and as having less legal merit. We expected these effects to be unique to claims involving sexual harassment as we did not anticipate that gender prototypicality would affect attitudes toward those making control grievance claims. We further hypothesized that attorneys' personal and metabeliefs about prototypes of sexual harassment victims would mediate the effects of plaintiff prototypicality on the dependent measures.

Civil rights attorneys (N = 553) from across the United States participated in an online survey. Sample demographics roughly approximated those of the American Bar Association at the time across gender (31.83% women, 67.27% men, 0.90% other genders), race (3.07% Black or African American, 3.80% East or Southeast Asian, 4.70% Latino/a or Hispanic, 1.99% Middle Eastern, 0.72% Native American or Alaska Native, 0.36% Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander, 88.43% White, and 3.44% other or declined to state), and age (M = 52.04 years). Attorneys reviewed an employment discrimination claim about either sexual harassment (experimental condition) or whistleblowing (control). We manipulated the description of the plaintiff such that she possessed either gender prototypical (i.e., feminine, communal) or nonprototypical (i.e., masculine, agentic) attributes, interests, and characteristics.

Attorneys reported that jurors perceive sexual harassment victims as more likely to resemble prototypical (vs. nonprototypical) women; however, attorneys did not rate nonprototypical (vs. prototypical) sexual harassment claimants as less credible or worthy of compensation and representation. Attorneys' personal and metabeliefs about prototypes of sexual harassment largely did not mediate effects.

These findings diverge from prior scholarship with laypeople and suggest that attorneys may draw upon their legal socialization and focus primarily on aspects of the cases rather than extralegal factors, like plaintiff prototypicality, when evaluating the merits of a case. The findings also suggest that exposure to claims with more individuating and contextual information may encourage careful reasoning and reduce reliance on stereotypes. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).