CLASS CONTENT

Is this particular interaction an example of sexual harassment or not?  What causes sexual harassment? What is the profile of a typical sexual harasser? How prevalent is it? How can it be prevented?  How can sexual harassment allegations best be investigated? What is a good institutional policy regarding sexual harassment? What is the best treatment for a sexual harassment victim?  What are the relevant laws regarding sexual harassment?

Sexual harassment is an important topic of study because the consequences of this problem can be so significant. Sexual harassment or allegations of sexual harassment can threaten one's financial security, physical well-being, social well-being, and psychological health. It is not, as some detractors might falsely assert, a clash of different but equally valid values, nor is it a minor breach of etiquette. It is, rather, a serious infliction of injury on another.

Till's system

The earliest and best-known attempt to specify the domain of sexual harassment was made by Till (1980), who classified the experiences of a large sample of college women into five general categories covering a wide spectrum of behaviors from sexist comments to rape. The first of these he labeled generalized sexist remarks and behavior; similar in many ways to racial harassment, such behavior is not aimed at sexual cooperation, but rather conveys insulting, degrading, or sexist remarks or inappropriate and offensive, but essentially sanction-free sexual advances; although such behavior is unwelcome and offensive, no penalty is attached to the woman's refusal to comply. The third category included solicitation of sexual activity or other sex-related behavior by promise of reward, and the fourth covered coercion of sexual activity by threat of punishment. Finally, Till reported instances of sexual crimes and misdemeanors, including rape and sexual assault.

Gruber's Typology of Personal and Environmental Harassment

Gruber (1982) proposed a  typology, based on an analysis of court cases and the research literature. He categorized harassment in three general categories: verbal request, verbal remarks, and nonverbal displays, each of which is further characterized by a number of sub categories. The verbal requests category, secure sexual cooperation, includes sexual bribery, sexual advances, relational advances, and subtle pressure/advances (this latter sub category refers to veiled, ambiguous, or humorous behavior whose intent may become clear only in retrospect or after considerable time has passed). Verbal remarks include personal remarks (e.g., offensive and embarrassing comments, jokes, or teasing) directed to a particular woman; subjective objectification, that is, comments, rumors, or statements made about women as a social category (e.g., All women are whores). Finally, nonverbal displays include physical behavior (sexual assault, sexual touching), sexual posturing (e.g., body language, vulgar gestures), and sexual materials (e.g., graffiti, pornography, profanation of women's sexuality or bodily functions).

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 VERBAL REQUESTS (more to less severe)

1. Sexual bribery with threat and/or promise of reward (quid pro quo)

2. Sexual advances-no threat, seeking sexual intimacy

3. Relational advances threat, repetitively seeking social relationship

4. Subtle pressures/advances--no threat, goal or target is implicit or ambiguous

VERBAL COMMENT (more to less severe)

1. Personal remarks unsolicited and directed to a woman

2. Subjective objectification rumors and/or comments made about a woman

3. Sexual categorical remarks about women in general

C. NONVERBAL DISPLAYS (more to less severe)

1. Sexual assault aggressive contact involving coercion

2. Sexual touching brief sexual or contextually sexualized

3. Sexual posturing violations of personal space or attempts at personal contact

4. Sexual materials pornographic materials, sexually demeaning objects, profanation of women's sexuality

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A. GENDER HARASSMENT

Verbal remarks

* personal remarks

* subjective objectification

* sexual categorical remarks

Nonverbal displays (symbolic)

* sexual posturing

* sexual materials Hostile Environment

* posters, graffiti

* profanation

B. UNWANTED SEXUAL ATTENTION

Verbal requests

* sexual advances

* relational advances

* subtle pressure/advances

Nonverbal displays (physical)

* sexual touching

* sexual assault

C. SEXUAL COERCION

Verbal requests

* sexual bribery Quid Pro Quo

* (threat)

Three specific characteristics of organizations that are tolerant of the existence of sexual harassment: refusal to take complaints seriously, risk to the victim for reporting, and lack of meaningful sanctions for the perpetrator.

Bystander stress is a variable identified by Schneider (1995) that refers to the discomfort, apprehension, and distress felt by individuals who work in a harassing environment but themselves have thus far not been targeted for harassment. Examples include watching or hearing about female coworkers being harassed, feeling apprehensive about one's own situation, and being asked to provide information or choose sides in a work group after a complaint has been made. Schneider (1995) recently provided initial confirmation that bystander stress contributes variance to psychological outcomes over and above that accounted for by sexual harassment itself.

Other individual factors that are likely to prove important are the woman's attributions about the event and, in particular, the degree of control she feels able to exert over the situation. Finally, considerable data exist suggesting that attitude and belief sets may influence victim appraisal in important ways. For example, Brooks and Perot (1991) found that victims' feminist ideology was a predictor of the perceived offensiveness of harassing behaviors, with women who identified more strongly as feminist generally finding harassment to be more offensive. Others have also found that feminists are more likely to have negative attitudes about harassment and to label harassing experiences as sexual harassment (Pryor & Day, 1988; Schneider, 1982); whether such influences also extend to other sorts of appraisals (e.g., the degree to which the behavior is upsetting, humiliating, or frightening) is currently unknown.

Developing your own definition of sexual harassment

 The Feminist Conception of Sexual Harassment:

1. Sexual harassment, a form of sexism, is at its root the domination of men over women.

2. When A sexually harasses B, the comment or behavior is really directed at all women, not a particular woman, because many derogatory behaviors are issued at women the harasser does not even know.

3. Only men can sexually harass women, because when a woman engages in apparently sexual behavior, the social impact and underlying message implicit in male-to-female harassment are missing.

4. Though a woman may consider a man to be a sex object, all the views about domination and being relegated to certain sex roles are absent. She cannot remind him that he is inferior because of his sex, since given the way things are in society, he is not.

5. Women cannot harm men as a group for it is impossible to send the message that one dominates (and so cause group harm) if one does not dominate.

6. What is decisive in determining whether behavior counts as sexual harassment is practice that expresses and perpetuates the attitude that the victim and members of her sex are inferior because of their sex.

7. The harasser's intentions are also irrelevant in assessing harassment; rather it is the attitudes embedded in the practice the behavior is an instance of, not the attitudes or intentions of the perpetrator, that make the behavior sexual harassment.

8. When A sexually harasses B, the comment or behavior is really directed at the group of all women, not just a particular woman, a point often missed by the courts. After all, many derogatory behaviors are issued at women the harasser does not even know (e.g., scanning a stranger's body). Even when the harasser knows his victim, the behavior is directed at the particular woman because she happens to be vulnerable at the time, though its message is for all woman. For instance, a catcall says not (merely) that the perpetrator likes a woman's body but that he thinks women are at least primarily sex objects and he, because of the power he holds by being in the dominant group gets to rate them according to how much pleasure they give him. Video-War Zone

9. Act in such a way that you always treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, never simply as a means, but always at the time as an end.

Types of sexual harassment:

1. Quid Pro Quo:

Quid Pro quo is the most obvious form of sexual harassment, involving the conditioning of employment benefits on sexual favors. As in traditional Title VII sex discrimination suits, the plaintiff must demonstrate that she was otherwise qualified to receive the relevant job benefit and that the job benefit was actually withheld or altered because of sexual harassment. The harassment may take several forms. Benefits may be withheld until a subordinate complies with sexual demands, a superior may retaliate against a subordinate for refusing to acquiesce, or a subordinate may comply with sexual demands and not receive a promised job benefit. Noncompliance has resulted in termination, transfer, denial or delay in receiving job benefits, and negative performance reviews. Underlying sexual harassment and other sexual discrimination claims is the requirement that, but for the sex of the complainant, the offending conduct would not have occurred (Boyd v. James S. Hayes Living Health Care Agency, 1987).

A plaintiff charging quid pro quo sexual harassment must prove by a preponderance of the evidence that she was denied an employment benefit because she refused to grant sexual favors (Bundy v. Jackson, 1981). In response an employer must show some legitimate motive for the adverse employment action, such as poor work performance, excessive absenteeism, lack of credentials, insubordination, dishonesty, personality conflict, violation of company policy, or lack of work. Unlike hostile environment harassment, a quid pro quo harassment claim may be based on a single incident.

2. Hostile Environment:

The concept of hostile environment sexual harassment has challenged courts to broaden their notions of sexual discrimination and offensive conduct. Hostile environment claims challenge workplace practices, rather than tangible job benefits, and consist of mental or physical conduct of a sexual nature  that unreasonably interferes with the employees' work or creates an intimidating, hostile or offensive working environment.

Victims of sexual harassment suffer stress effects from the harassment. Stress as a result of sexual harassment is recognized as a specific, diagnosable problem by the American Psychiatric Association Among the stress effect suffered is work performance stress, which includes distraction from tasks, dread of work, and an inability to work. Another form is emotional stress, which covers a range of responses, including anger, fear of physical safety, anxiety, depression, guilt, humiliation, and embarrassment. Physical stress also results from sexual harassment; it may manifest itself as sleeping problems headaches, weight changes, and other physical ailments. A study by the Working Women's Institute found that ninety-six-percent (96%) were afflicted with physical stress problems.

Sexual harassment has a cumulative, eroding effect on the victim's well-being, When women feel a need to maintain vigilance against the next incident of harassment, the stress is increased tremendously When women feel that their individual complaints will not change the work environment materially, the ensuing sense of despair further compounds the stress.

An employer or supervisor also can alter working conditions by, for example, denigrating the employee in front of other workers, constantly picking on her, monitoring the plaintiff's work more closely than others, threatening her job security, or giving he employee different work assignments or less desirable physical facilities.

Victims of sexual harassment often tolerated offensive conduct in fear of retribution. Failure to report incidents of harassment, however, may suggest to the court that the conduct was not so sever or pervasive as to alter the plaintiff's condition of employment. Courts almost always consider whether the plaintiff complained of the challenged conduct in making a determination of hostile environment.

Women in male-dominated workplaces report more experiences of harassment than women in other work settings. Similarly, women in male-dominated occupations both in North America and Europe report higher rates of harassment than women in either traditionally female or gender-balanced occupations. It appears that women who work in male-dominated positions are victimized more frequently because of male cultural norms that influence work-related and social activities. Specifically, male-dominated workplaces or occupations generally emphasize sexual aggression, sexual bravado and posturing, or denigration of that which is defined as soft or feminine. Normative male culture may also affect women who are low in seniority or function in low-status positions in an organization, and women in these positions report high rates of harassment.

Identifying the person who has the likelihood to sexually harass (LSH)

For many years, what little was known about people who harass came from the descriptions of self-reported victims. For example, in a 1981 survey, women who were the targets of uninvited sexual attention reported that the men who harassed them were typically older, married, and of the same race. It was not until 1987 that Pryor reported the development of a methodology whereby the psychological characteristics of potential harassers could be scientifically studied. This methodology is conceptually similar to a methodology used by Malamuth (1981, 1986) in the study of rape proclivities. In Pryor,s technique, men are asked to image themselves in a series of scenarios in which they have interaction between a male college professor and a female student who is seeking to raise her grade in a class. Male subjects are asked to rate the likelihood of their performing an act of quid pro quo sexual harassment in each scenario given they believe that they could do so with impunity. In the professor/student scenario, for example, how likely is it that the subject would raise the student's grade in exchange for sexual favors given that his behavior would go unpunished?

The Reliability of the Likelihood to Sexually Harass (LSH) scale has proved to be high in all samples assessed. (Typically coefficient alpha has exceeded .90.) Across a series of studies, Pryor and his colleagues have examined the self report, social cognitive, and behavioral correlates of the LSH. Below we will review these findings. Some come from previously published studies as cited and others from unpublished data. All studies used college men as subjects.

Higher LSH men tended to describe themselves using socially undesirable terms such as hostile Pryor and Williams (1989) found significant relationships between LSH and three scales developed by Brannon and Junni (1984) to measure endorsement of a stereotypic male sex role norm: Antifeminitiy (r = .32), Status (r = .39), and Toughness (r = .38; sample N = 84). Antifeminity relates to the belief that men should avoid stereotypical feminine occupations and activities. Status relates to men's need to achieve status and others= respect. Toughness relates to the believe that men should be mentally, emotionally, and physically self-reliant (Thompson & Pleck, 1986). The profile that emerges form these findings is that LSH is related to an identification with a stereotypic view of masculinity. High LSH men tend to view themselves as hyper masculine.

Pryor and Stoller (1994) examined the relationship between LSH and a series of scales developed by Nelson (1979) to measure the psychological functions of or reasons people engage in sexual behavior (sample N = 117). The strongest correlate with LSH was a scale Nelson labels Dominance (r = .45). According to Nelson, this scale relates to a desire to control ones= sexual partners. Other Nelson functions of Sexuality scales also correlated with LSH: Novelty seeking sex as a defense against boredom (r = .44); Recognition seeking sex as a way to impress others (r=.33). One thing apparently unrelated to the sexual motives characteristic of the high LSH man is any sense of seeking sex as a means to an emotional relationship with a woman. Nelson's scale assessing Love and Affection as a goal of sex was uncorrelated with LSH.

Likelihood to Sexually Harass (LSH)

Imagine that you are the owners of a modeling agency. Your agency specialized in sexy female models used in television commercials. One of your models, Amy T., is a particularly ravishing brunette. You stop her after work one day and ask her to have dinner with you. She coldly declines your offer and tells you that she would like to keep your relationship with her strictly business A few months later you find that business is slack and you have to lay off some of your employees. You can choose to lay off Amy or one of four other women. All are good models, but someone has to go. How likely are you to do the following things in this situation?

While working as a consultant in a governmental organization, the first author came upon an example of gender-based hazing that exemplifies some essential qualities of this kind of harassment. New female workers in a predominantly male office were given a computer disk on their first day of work and told to inset it into a computer that occupied a work carrel for a tutorial. When inserted into the computer, the program on the disk produced a loud orgasmic sound and a feminine voice exclaimed, Oh-oh-oh, that's a big one. Men from the office were huddled around the periphery of the carrel observing the reactions of the unsuspecting female and laughing. One social psychological function of this sophomoric prank seemed to be to reinforce the in group identification of the male workers. In addition, this initiation ceremony marked the female's status as an outsider to the all-male club.

Sexual Priming and the Hostile Work Environment

Stereotypic beliefs can be elicited by the environment as well as carried around in people's heads. Thus, specific features of an environment can make sexuality more salient for all people in that setting. Consider a recent study by McKenzie-Mohr and Zanna (1990). In their experiment, male students viewed a videotape of a prostitutes having sex with a client, an experience that presumably primed or made salient a sexual schema. When these men subsequently interacted with a female interviewer in a discussion of a neutral topic, carry-over effects of the film were evident. Compared to men in a control condition who had watched a political debate, the sexually primed men recalled more physical characteristics of the woman who interviewed them. This tendency to focus on the physical was particularly strong among men who described themselves in primarily masculine terms: these men recalled more of the interviewer's appearance, recalled less of the information she have them, and were perceived by the interviewer to be more sexually motivated during the interview. Thus, in this study both characteristics of the en and cues in the environment made sexuality more salient in men's reactions to women.

Measuring the impact of Sexual Harassment

Several studies used surveys to determine the impact of sexual harassment by asking respondents to self-report the effect of experienced harassment on job performance, morale, and leaving the organization or job. For example, Crull (1979) assessed the effects of sexual harassment on productivity and health for a sample of 92 women who had described an experience coinciding with the Working Women's Institute's definition of sexual harassment. Questionnaires were originally sent to 325 women who had written letters to the Institute, indicating that they had been sexually harassed. Ninety-six percent of the women reported emotional stress symptom, 83% interference with job performance, 63% physical stress symptoms, and 21% sought therapeutic help. Crull (1979) concluded that sexual harassment kept this group of women underpaid, under-employed, and unemployed in both direct and indirect ways as well as stated that the women were denied advancement opportunity, passed up for raises, and received poor work evaluations for reasons unrelated to performance. In this study (and others), independent measures of job performance were not utilized, nor was a causal link established between sexual harassment and performance outcomes controlling for other potential determinants (e.g., accidents, medical conditions, etc.) Of decrements in performance, etc. Further, no evidence was supplied that indicated the respondents were actually denied advancement opportunities, etc. as a result  of sexual harassment.