Exploring the role of culture in sexual objectification: A seven nations study

Sexual objectification seeing or treating a person as a sexual object - has been the topic of considerable investigation. Building from along-standing recognition of the potential importance of culture in sexual objectification, this paper focuses on the extent to which people in different parts of the world objectify themselves and others. We explored sexual objectification amongst 588 people in seven diverse nations (i.e., Australia, India, Italy, Japan, Pakistan, the UK, and the USA). Participants completed standard measures of self- and other-objectification. The results revealed that culture did affect self- and other-objectification, with objectification emerging more robustly in Australia, Italy, the UK, and the USA than it did in India, Japan, and Pakistan. These findings help support theoretical claims that culture matters for sexual objectification. Future research directions are discussed.