Exploring sexual harassment and related attitudes in Beninese high schools: a field study

Abstract

Sexual harassment severely impacts the educational system in the West African country Benin and the progress of women in this society that is characterized by great gender inequality. Knowledge of the belief systems rooting in the sociocultural context is crucial to the understanding of sexual harassment. However, no study has yet investigated how sexual harassment is related to fundamental beliefs in Benin or West African countries. We conducted a field study on 265 female and male students from several high schools in Benin to investigate the link between sexual harassment and measures of ambivalent sexism, gender identity, and rape myth acceptance. Almost half of the sample reported having experienced sexual harassment personally or among peers. Levels of sexism and rape myth acceptance were very high compared to other studies. These attitudes appeared to converge in a sexist belief system that was linked to personal experiences, the perceived probability of experiencing and fear of sexual harassment. Results suggest that sexual harassment is a societal problem and that interventions need to address fundamental attitudes held in societies low in gender equality.

How are gender inequality and violence against women related? Findings from a population‐level community attitudes survey

“…adversarial sexual beliefs, attitudes toward women and hostility toward women). A relationship between low support for GE and VAWSA is confirmed for attitudes representing each of the separate gendered patterns in Table 1 (Fabiano et al, 2003;Adana et al, 2011;de Puiseau & Roessel, 2013;Fulu et al, 2013;Giovannelli & Jackson, 2013;Haj-Yahia et al, 2015;Austin et al, 2016;Fox & Potocki, 2016;Papp et al, 2017;Hill & Marshall, 2018). However, research examining the relative contribution of different dimensions of GI to VAWSA is limited to comparing the relative influence of benevolent and hostile sexism.…”

Measurement and prevalence of sexual harassment in low- and middle-income countries: a systematic review and meta-analysis

“…Studies (77.5%, n=38) were primarily focused on either a workplace or educational setting, with only 11 studies focused on public spaces, such as public transport, streets or the community. Among educational settings, most were higher educational institutions with four studies [33][34][35][36] focused on adolescents at secondary schools. All, but two studies were observational with crosssectional surveys; only two studies had a longitudinal design.…”

‘She is not a virgin so why refuse the lecturer sex?’: An appraisal of cyberspace discourse of sexual harassment in Nigerian tertiary institutions

“…Literature on sex-related crimes in societies have explicated the stereotypical representation of males and females in news about the crime. (Lindqvist, 2018; Yee et al, 2015; Puiseau and Roessel (2013); Andreasen, 2021; Herrera et al, 2016; etc.). Sexual harassment exists in secondary and post-secondary institutions of learning, and gender is the major contributory factor to sexual harassment (Kabaya, 2016).…”

“…Extant literature on sexual harassment in universities have investigated the gender disparity in opinions about what constitutes sexual harassment (Ferrer-Pérez and Bosch-Fiol, 2014; Wamoyi et al, 2022); the impact of sexual harassment on victims (Sinko et al, 2021); universities’ intervention programmes to address sexual harassment (Moore and Mennicke, 2020; Skewes et al, 2021); the relationship between socio-cultural beliefs and perceptions about sexual harassment (Yee et al, 2015; Puiseau and Roessel, 2013); the influence of physical attractiveness on perceptions about sexual harassment (Herrera et al, 2016); the portrayal of female victims of sexual harassment in internet memes (Andreasen, 2021); patterns of oppositional rhetorics in online conversations about sexual harassment and assault on university campuses (Phillips and Chagnon, 2021); etc. All of these studies have demonstrated the influence of gender stereotypes, rape myths, societal norms, etc.…”