Sexual harassment is a prevalent form of victimization that most antibullying programs ignore and teachers and school officials often fail to recognize, according to bullying and youth violence expert Dorothy L. Espelage, Ph.D.
The recent teen suicide of Brandy Vela, a teen in Texas City, Texas, is a case in point. According to Vela’s parents, the teen fatally shot herself following months of bullying and sexual harassment, perpetrated in part through text messages and social media.
Espelage recently led a five-year study that examined links between bullying and sexual harassment among schoolchildren in Illinois.
Nearly half — 43 percent — of middle school students surveyed for the study reported they had been the victims of verbal sexual harassment such as sexual comments, jokes, or gestures during the prior year.
Researchers followed 1,300 Illinois youths from middle school to high school, examining the risk factors associated with bullying and sexual harassment and the characteristics of the perpetrators.
Students from four middle schools completed the surveys, and some of the youths and their teachers also were interviewed by the researchers.
Investigators discovered that while verbal harassment was more common than physical sexual harassment or sexual assault, 21 percent of students reported having been touched, grabbed, or pinched in a sexual way, and 18 percent said peers had brushed up against them in a suggestive manner.
Students also reported being forced to kiss the perpetrators, having their private areas touched without consent and being “pantsed;” having their pants or shorts jerked down by someone else in public.
[For more of this story, written by Rick Nauert, go to http://psychcentral.com/news/2...s-common/113754.html]
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