A new study by the American Political Science Association found that a “sizable” minority of women have experienced harassment or other inappropriate behavior at the annual meeting of the APSA.
While 63 percent of APSA’s members who responded to the survey reported not experiencing harassment or negative forms of behavior at the last four APSA Annual Meetings (2013-2016), the numbers diverged for women and men who reported 51 percent and 74 percent of no harassment, respectively.
Moreover, APSA’s youngest colleagues, women and “those who attend meetings more regularly are more likely to have these experiences” of harassment, said Drs. Virginia Sapiro of Boston University and David Campbell of the University of Notre Dame, who authored the report.
The APSA Professional Ethics, Rights and Freedoms committee fashioned the report after surveying the entire APSA membership between February and March 2017. Out of 13,367 total members contacted, the association analyzed 2,424 completed surveys, yielding a response rate of 18.1 percent.
The survey examined and detailed responses in three distinct categories of negative behavior:
Forty-two percent of women and 22 percent of men responded that they experienced “feeling put down” or “experienced condescension” at the annual meeting. This statistic was nearly one-third of respondents and the statistic is equally divided between those who reported that it happened to them once (15.1 percent) and those who reported that it has happened more than once (16.6 percent).
Thirty percent of women and 10 percent of men responded that they experienced “inappropriate language or looks, such as experiencing offensive sexist remarks; getting stared at, leered or ogled in a way that made them uncomfortable; or being exposed to sexist or suggestive materials which they found offensive.”
