Sexual Harassment within Academia

Abstract

This research is conducted to explore the factors that lead to sexual harassment. The goal of this research was to have a better understanding of sexual harassment in higher education. The focus of the research is on the prevalence of sexual harassment among students and teachers. To find out the consequences of sexual harassment on individuals. The main objective was to collect stories from students and teachers about their experiences. The qualitative method was used; the data for the study comes from in-depth interviews with 22 respondents. 14 students and 8 teachers were selected from the University of Punjab, Lahore, and Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad. The respondents were selected through purposive and snowball sampling techniques, and further in-depth semi-structured interviews were conducted with the selected respondents. Many female students admitted of experiencing harassment, sexual harassment is reported by one out of 10 female students in preliminary sure. Most of the students were sexually harassed verbally, non-verbally, and physically by male teachers at the university, many incidents are often not reported to any legal authorities against predators. The reasons for remaining silent were fear of academic troubles, embarrassment, distrust toward legal systems, and, most importantly, fear of social stigmatization. The culture of remaining silent against sexual harassment would be the cause of increasing its prevalence in higher education in Pakistan