Sexual harassment and sexual intimacy in learning environments

Canadian Psychology, Feb 1996 by Pyke, Sandra W

Anne Innis Dagg and her co - author, Patricia Thompson (1988) provide a compendium of examples of harassing events drawn from university campuses across the country which illustrate these definitions. More recent examples are represented in the responses to the date rape campaigns at Queen's (Harris, 1991), the comments trivializing gang rape and sexual assault in the student paper of the Agricultural Students' Association at the University of Saskatchewan (Kilcoyne, 1990), the assault on Women's Studies Programs in the Alberta Report (Byfield, 1991), the panty raids at Wilfrid Laurier University (Harris, 1991), the anti - women and anti - feminist graffiti at York University (Barrell, 1991) and at the University of Waterloo (Greenhill, 1992), the Mary Warner case at Brock University (Harrison, 1993), the graffiti in the University of Victoria library -- "MONTREAL SCORE: them -- 0, us -- 14" (Whittington, 1990), and the threats of physical and sexual harassment received by womenat the University of British Columbia (Hookham & Merriam, 1991). All of these examples are, of course, minor in comparison with the tragic events of December 1989 at l'Ecole Polytechnique (Malette & Chalouh, 1991).

INCIDENCE

Estimates of the frequency of sexual harassment vary considerably. Incidence figures derived from surveys at Canadian universities are summarized in Table 1.

It is quite clear from the studies reported in Table 1 that huge variability exists in the reported incidence of perceived sexual harassment. The variability in incidence is matched by the diversity in the behaviours and/or events assessed and the determination of whether such behaviours and events constitute sexual harassment. Nevertheless, there is a consistent tendency for lower incidence figures to be associated with males, and even the lower points of the range for females indicate that sexual harassment is not uncommon in academic settings. These findings support Cammaert's (1985) conclusion that "experiencing sexually inappropriate and harassing behaviour appears to be a relatively common experience for women students on one Canadian campus." (p.388).

CONSEQUENCES

Characteristic of the psychological concomitants of sexual harassment are feelings of shame and guilt combined with a sense of powerlessness, anxiety, vulnerability and exploitation. In her account of her response to 51 personal experiences of harassment, Larkin (1991) lists a wide range of emotions -- "feelings of being either upset, angry, frustrated, frightened, annoyed, uncomfortable, startled, silenced, confused, humiliated, demeaned, degraded, or embarrassed (or a combination of these) in every incident, including those in which I demonstrated no visible response." (p. 112). "A situation which elicits such reactions creates learning conditions in which women's experiences in the academic setting are both different from and unequal to those of male students." (Walker, Erickson & Woolsey, 1985, p. 426). A number of the women graduate students in the Cammaert sample (1985) reported quite serious side effects as a consequence of the harassing experience, including negative effects on academic standing, and even in one case, withdrawal from the university. Whittington (1990) reports that victims often leave a class, switch programs and/or settle for a lesser grade or a poor evaluation. And, should a student report sexual harassment, there is great concern about the possibility of retaliation. In one instance cited by Whittington (1990), a graduate student refused to have a sexual relationship with her supervisor. Although he agreed to stop pressuring her, he also stopped commenting on her academic work and she lost her fellowship.