Sexual harassment on campus: Effects of professor gender on perception of sexually harassing behaviors

Abstract

Undergraduate students viewed four videotaped vignettes that depicted potentially sexually harassing interactions between professors and students. Subjects were asked to evaluate the professor's behavior. The vignettes were composed so that two dimensions were manipulated: the sex of the initiator of the behavior and the type of behavior. Results of the study provided partial support of the following hypotheses: (1) the behaviors of female professors initiating potentially sexually harassing behaviors toward male students would be perceived as more appropriate than would the same behaviors initiated by male professors toward female students in identical situations; (2) female subjects would interpret the behaviors as more harassing than male subjects; and finally (3) subtle forms of harassment would be interpreted as more inappropriate by female students than by male students.