Abstract
Sexual harassment has been widely studied in the workforce, but the factors that contribute to hostile educational environments for women have received less attention. The present study focuses on male dominance, gender harassment, gender threats, masculinity, and their influences on creating a hostile environment for women in academia. One hundred and forty-two male participants from a private university in the Southwestern United States self-reported their masculinity, completed a group task with a female confederate leader serving as a gender threat in half the conditions, and had their subsequent affect, perceptions of leadership effectiveness, and behavioral aggression measured. Men from male-dominated majors and men who had received a gender threat did not differ from men from gender-equivalent majors and men who had not received a gender threat on affect, perceptions of leadership effectiveness, or behavioral aggression (ps > 0.201, ηp2s ≤ 0.007). However, post-hoc analyses revealed that as masculinity increased among men from male-dominated majors under gender threat, they became significantly more behaviorally aggressive (b = 5.92, p = 0.003) and perceived their female leader as less effective (b = −0.83, p = 0.076). Implications and suggestions for future research are discussed.
Highlights
Introduction and Literature ReviewThe sexual harassment awareness campaign #MeToo was named Time’s Person of the Year for2017, and its impact continues to spread around the globe (Zacharek et al 2017)
The primary purpose of this experiment was to determine the influence of gender threat and male dominance within a major on subsequent behavior, affect, and cognition
In order to test Hypotheses 1 and 2, that men in the high gender threat condition and men from male-dominated majors will be more aggressive toward their female leader, have more negative affect, and perceive their female leader as less effective, than men in the low gender threat condition and men from gender-equivalent majors, and Hypotheses 3, 4, and 5, that an interaction will exist wherein men in the gender threat condition who are from male-dominated majors will be the most aggressive, the DV’s were submitted as the dependent variables to separate 2 × 2 ANOVAs
Summary
Introduction and Literature ReviewThe sexual harassment awareness campaign #MeToo was named Time’s Person of the Year for2017, and its impact continues to spread around the globe (Zacharek et al 2017). Women in male-dominated environments are more likely to experience a hostile work environment, a form of sexual harassment recognized by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), and report experiences that include, but are not limited to, doubts about their legitimacy and competence, blocked access to promotion, and personal hostility as they demonstrate proficiency in male-typed tasks (Heilman et al 2004; McLaughlin et al 2012; Taylor 2016; Rudman and Glick 1999). Whereas harassment that occurs in the workforce has been heavily focused upon by previous research and the media, recent research regarding the experiences of women in academia demonstrated that reports of gender harassment in male-dominated majors are significantly higher than those in gender-equivalent majors at our universities (Dresden et al 2017).
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