Impact of a Planned Sexual Harassment Protective Program on Feeling of Safety and Self Confidence among Adolescent Girls

Abstract

Background: Sexual harassment is a widespread phenomenon among adolescents. Its emergence is correlated to biological development; this behavior is neither normative nor socially appropriate given the negative impact on victims and its association with other aggressive and violent behavior. Enhancing adolescents’ self-confidence is helpful in empowering then to feel safe and protected against this antisocial phenomenon. Aim: is to assess the impact of a planned sexual harassment protective program on feeling of safety and self confidence among adolescent girls. Design: A quasi experimental research design was utilized. Setting: The study was conducted in two secondary schools at Menoufia Governerate: (1) El-Sanawia banat old secondary school. (2) El-Sanawia banat new secondary school. Sample: a number of 100 secondary school adolescent girls were selected randomly from the previously mentioned settings. Tools: Two tools were used for data collection. Tool one: Students’ knowledge questionnaire: it consisted of two parts. Part one: a structured: socio-demographic questionnaire to obtain demographic data about the studied sample. Part two: - sexual harassment structured questionnaire. Tool two: Five points Likert- scale structured questionnaire regarding degree of self confidence and felling of safety of adolescent girls. .Results: The results of the current study showed that, there were highly statistically significant differences between pre and after implementation of planned sexual harassment protective program of studied group regarding their level of confidence in their abilities and their actions for facing sexual harassment. Also, highly statistically significant differences were found between pre and after implementation of planned sexual harassment protective program of studied group concerning levels of self confidence and feeling of safety where p: (<0.001). Conclusion: it was concluded that, adolescent girls had significant improvement in their feeling of safety and self confidence after utilization of a planned sexual harassment protective program .Recommendation: the study recommended to urgently utilize a planned sexual harassment protective programs for all adolescent girls as a mean to protect themselves and enhance their feeling of safety and self confidence regarding this negative phenomenon.