Is It Harassment? Perceptions of Sexual Harassment Among Lawyers and Undergraduate Students

Shechory-Bitton, Mally; Zvi, Liza

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2020.01793

Cited by 10 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 76 publications

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“…Responses for each item were given on a scale of 1 (very little agreement) to 5 (very high agreement). The items were taken from previous research on perceptions of criminal cases (e.g., Shechory-Bitton & Zvi, 2015, 2016, 2019, 2020).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Double Standard Toward Female and Male Victims of Non-consensual Dissemination of Intimate Images

Zvi

2021

J Interpers Violence

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Non-consensual dissemination of intimate images (NCII) is a growing problem of sexual violence with grave consequences for victims. However, despite recent criminalization and civil and legal sanctions, there is reason to suspect that the majority of NCII cases remain unreported. The reasons for that may be similar to the ones accounting for under-reporting in cases of physical sexual violence and are tied to society’s attitude toward victims. Being a relatively new form of violence, psychological research on perceptions of NCII victims and offenders is scarce. The purpose of the present study was to extend the current knowledge by comparing perceptions toward female and male victims of NCII, while manipulating the victim’s role in producing the intimate material. Drawing on rape research, it was hypothesized that gender stereotypes interact with victims’ sex and behavior to influence the way victims are perceived. Five-hundred and thirty-nine male and female students were presented with a scenario depicting an NCII offense in which the intimate material was either self-generated by the victim (selfies) or stealth-taken by the victim’s ex-intimate partner. Victim and offender sex were also manipulated. The findings indicate a differential treatment toward female and male victims of NCII, depending on their role in the taking of the intimate images. More blaming was attributed toward a female victim whose intimate images were self-taken, in comparison to all other research conditions, and negative feelings toward her were the highest as well. These blame attributions, as well as negative feelings toward female victims, were particularly high on the side of male participants. The findings are interpreted as reflecting perceptions of traditional gender roles and a double standard toward female and male sexual behavior.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Double Standard Toward Female and Male Victims of Non-consensual Dissemination of Intimate Images

Zvi

2021

J Interpers Violence

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“…The present study is part of a research project aimed at assessing lawyers’ perceptions in cases of sexual harassment. A previous study within this project focused on assessing such effects and indicated discriminatory judgments of SH based on victim and offender gender [ 48 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

In the eye of the beholder: Decision-making of lawyers in cases of sexual harassment

Zvi

Shechory-Bitton

2022

PLoS ONE

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Objective The purpose of the present study was to examine the effect of deliberative vs. intuitive thinking styles on forensic judgments of legal professionals. Two hypotheses were tested: (a) that low deliberative thinking would be related to judgmental biases (b) that lawyers would report a greater tendency and preference toward deliberative thinking in comparison to students and make more rational judgments. Method Ninety-one lawyers and 120 undergraduate students, who served as controls, were asked to read a criminal case depicting sexual harassment (SH) and judge victim and offender blame, whether the case constitutes SH, and the damage for the victim. Results Deliberative thinking of lawyers was higher than students, and higher than their intuitive thinking style, supporting the more rational blame attributions of the former. In addition, higher deliberative thinking was related to a stronger perception of the event as SH. Nevertheless, all the participants were more inclined to perceive the case as SH when the victim was a woman instead of a man. Conclusions The results suggest that gender stereotypes and bias may persist despite high deliberative thinking and may even be manifested through deliberative thinking processes. Awareness of legal professionals of these biases as well as the development of more objective tools which will help make the judging process less subjective—will ensure more accurate assessment of victims, offenders, and cases.

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“…As sexual harassment is more prevalent among females, the positive effects of intervention strategies may be more apparent among female students. Concerning males, the lack of same-sex harassment prevention mechanisms results in male students’ fear of experiencing mistrust and attribution, increasing their tolerance for sexual harassment (Kumar & Verma, 2020; Shechory-Bitton & Zvi, 2020).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Association Between Sexual Harassment Intervention Strategies and the Sexual Harassment Perception and Attitude of University Students in Beijing, China

He,

Wang,

Wang

et al. 2023

J Interpers Violence

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Sexual harassment in universities harms the physical and psychological health and development of students. Although Chinese universities are required to implement sexual harassment interventions, few studies have estimated how well interventions are perceived by students and the association with their perceptions and attitudes toward sexual harassment. This study aims to examine the perceptions and attitudes toward sexual harassment and perceived sexual harassment interventions among university students. Further, it evaluated the association between sexual harassment interventions and sexual harassment perceptions and attitudes among university students and explored potential gender differences in the observed associations. We categorized sexual harassment interventions into three types of strategies (informal education activities, prevention mechanisms, and multiformat publicity) and designed an 8-item scale for sexual harassment perception and a 10-item scale for sexual harassment attitude. A total of 872 students were recruited from six universities in Beijing, China. Association between intervention strategies and sexual harassment perceptions and attitudes was analyzed using multiple linear regression. The results showed that 78.56% of the university students recognized all sexual harassment behaviors, and 11.58% felt angry about all sexual harassment behaviors. Male students felt angrier at same-sex harassment than female students ( p < .001). Overall, the students were aware of approximately 3 of the 13 sexual harassment interventions. None of the three intervention strategies was significantly associated with perceptions of sexual harassment ( p > .050). The attitude toward sexual harassment was positively associated with informal education activities (coeff = 0.055, p = .015) and multiformat publicity (coeff = 0.077, p = .030) among female students, and negatively associated with prevention mechanisms (coeff = −0.123, p = .033) among male students. Our findings imply that sexual harassment interventions are not well known among university students. Universities should develop and propagate more sexual harassment informal education activities and multiformat publicity intervention strategies and pay more attention to gender differences in intervention strategies.

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Is It Harassment? Perceptions of Sexual Harassment Among Lawyers and Undergraduate Students

Cited by 10 publications

References 76 publications

The Double Standard Toward Female and Male Victims of Non-consensual Dissemination of Intimate Images

The Double Standard Toward Female and Male Victims of Non-consensual Dissemination of Intimate Images

In the eye of the beholder: Decision-making of lawyers in cases of sexual harassment

Association Between Sexual Harassment Intervention Strategies and the Sexual Harassment Perception and Attitude of University Students in Beijing, China

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