Sexual Objectification in the Workplace: When and Why Does it Represent Sexual Harassment?

Differences in the eyes of the beholders: The roles of subjective and objective judgments in sexual harassment claims.

“…First, although our manipulation checks demonstrated the effectiveness of the pervasive objectification manipulation, we found no effects of objectification on either experiencer emotion or performance thus failing to support Hypotheses 1 and 2. These results are consistent with Wiener et al, (2013, see also Gervais et al, 2015), who reported no relationship between objectification and either experienced emotion or performance on laboratory tasks. One explanation for the lack of objectification effects on performance might be that in our paradigm, the experiencers complete the tasks by themselves and not in the presence of the men who were responsible for the gazes and comments.…”

“…Experiment 1 demonstrated the effects of pervasive sexual objectification on the harassment judgments of targets of that objectification in a randomized controlled laboratory experiment. We have now used this experimental paradigm to demonstrate sexual objectification effects in the context of sexual harassment judgments three times (Wiener et al, 2013; Gervais et al, 2015), consistent with other findings in a large literature pertaining to sexual objectification (cf., Calogero, Tantleff-Dunn, & Thompson, 2011; Moradi & Huang, 2008) and an even larger literature examining judgments of harassment (cf., McDonald, Graham, & Martin, 2010; Wiener et al, 2010). Replicating Wiener et al (2013), this study showed that the effects were direct, not mediated by experienced emotions.…”

“…However, it also showed the effects of objectification did not impact the work performance of the women subjected to sociosexual conduct despite the fact that those who observed and read about the objectification expected that it would lower the experiencers’ performances. Extending Wiener et al (2013) and Gervais et al (2015), the present investigation extended this consideration to pervasiveness of objectification, thereby showing the differential effects of pervasive objectification on the subjective and objective prongs of hostile environment law.…”

“…We believe that the knowledge gained through our carefully executed procedures outweighs the potential costs of making some participants feel uncomfortable for a short period of time during the interview process. The independent reviewers of the university IRB agreed, allowing us to conduct several studies using these procedures (Gervais, Vescio, & Allen, 2011; Gervais et al, 2015; Wiener et al, 2013).…”

“…Although some women perceive sexual objectification positively (Liss, Erchull, & Ramsey, 2011), others may view it as inappropriate and from their subjective perspective it may represent mis conduct in the form of harassment when it occurs in work settings. To initially examine this possibility, Wiener, Gervais, Allen, and Marquez (2013, see also Gervais, Wiener, Allen, Farnum, & Kimble, 2015 for replication with community members) studied harassment judgments in a simulated workplace setting from the perspectives of experiencers (akin to potential complainants—the subjective prong), predictors (akin to potential EEOC officers, juries, judges—the objective prong), and observers (akin to potential coworkers and witnesses—also the objective prong). A male confederate interviewed potential lab workers (experiencers) for a lab job, introducing the objectification manipulation by gazing at the participants’ chests accompanied by an appearance comment (sexual objectification), or maintaining eye contact with a nonappearance remark (no-objectification control).…”