Female Adults’ Experiences of Sexual Harassment and Assault in the Presence of Others: A Qualitative Analysis of the Effectiveness and Consequences of Bystander Intervention Strategies

Bystander intervention programs aim to reduce the acceptance of violence against women by fostering prosocial behavior from community members, and often provide knowledge on behaviors associated with sexual risk and ways a bystander can intervene. However, there is limited knowledge on which intervention strategies are used, and how these interventions impact perpetrator behavior and incidence of verbal and physical harm to those involved. There is even less research on these phenomena from the perspective of the victim. To address these gaps, the current study utilized a qualitative approach to (1) identify bystander intervention strategies employed; (2) discuss trends of the presence of certain strategies as it relates to the perpetrator’s behavior being unchanged, paused, or stopped towards the victim at the event-level; and (3) examine general trends between the presence of strategies and verbal and physical harm from the perspective of the victimized individual. Adult women between the ages of 18 to 30 (N = 25, college student = 80%) were interviewed about their experiences of bystander intervention during an unwanted sexual interaction since the age of 16 years old. Results suggested that: (1) distance, direct, distract, delegate, and proximity strategies were identified by victims of sexual harassment and assault; (2) distance or direct strategies were most frequently present when the perpetrator’s behavior was stopped towards the victim at the event-level; (3) the incidence rate of verbal and physical harm, though low, occurred more frequently when a direct or distance strategy was involved. Because distance and direct strategies most frequently mentioned overall in the stories, further research is needed to disentangle whether these strategies are more effective at thwarting sexual assault or related to harms than other strategies or just employed more often. Future research should attempt to replicate and extend the present findings in a larger and more diverse sample

Female Adults’ Experiences of Sexual Harassment and Assault in the Presence of Others: A Qualitative Analysis of the Effectiveness and Consequences of Bystander Intervention Strategies

Bystander intervention programs aim to reduce the acceptance of violence against women by fostering prosocial behavior from community members, and often provide knowledge on behaviors associated with sexual risk and ways a bystander can intervene. However, there is limited knowledge on which intervention strategies are used, and how these interventions impact perpetrator behavior and incidence of verbal and physical harm to those involved. There is even less research on these phenomena from the perspective of the victim. To address these gaps, the current study utilized a qualitative approach to (1) identify bystander intervention strategies employed; (2) discuss trends of the presence of certain strategies as it relates to the perpetrator’s behavior being unchanged, paused, or stopped towards the victim at the event-level; and (3) examine general trends between the presence of strategies and verbal and physical harm from the perspective of the victimized individual. Adult women between the ages of 18 to 30 (N = 25, college student = 80%) were interviewed about their experiences of bystander intervention during an unwanted sexual interaction since the age of 16 years old. Results suggested that: (1) distance, direct, distract, delegate, and proximity strategies were identified by victims of sexual harassment and assault; (2) distance or direct strategies were most frequently present when the perpetrator’s behavior was stopped towards the victim at the event-level; (3) the incidence rate of verbal and physical harm, though low, occurred more frequently when a direct or distance strategy was involved. Because distance and direct strategies most frequently mentioned overall in the stories, further research is needed to disentangle whether these strategies are more effective at thwarting sexual assault or related to harms than other strategies or just employed more often. Future research should attempt to replicate and extend the present findings in a larger and more diverse sample

Host genotype and genetic diversity shape the evolution of a novel bacterial infection

Pathogens continue to emerge from increased contact with novel host species. Whilst these hosts can represent distinct environments for pathogens, the impacts of host genetic background on how a pathogen evolves post-emergence are unclear. In a novel interaction, we experimentally evolved a pathogen (Staphylococcus aureus) in populations of wild nematodes (Caenorhabditis elegans) to test whether host genotype and genetic diversity affect pathogen evolution. After ten rounds of selection, we found that pathogen virulence evolved to vary across host genotypes, with differences in host metal ion acquisition detected as a possible driver of increased host exploitation. Diverse host populations selected for the highest levels of pathogen virulence, but infectivity was constrained, unlike in host monocultures. We hypothesise that population heterogeneity might pool together individuals that contribute disproportionately to the spread of infection or to enhanced virulence. The genomes of evolved populations were sequenced, and it was revealed that pathogens selected in distantly-related host genotypes diverged more than those in closely-related host genotypes. S. aureus nevertheless maintained a broad host range. Our study provides unique empirical insight into the evolutionary dynamics that could occur in other novel infections of wildlife and humans

2018-2019 Master Class - Erika Eckert (Viola)

https://spiral.lynn.edu/conservatory_masterclasses/1174/thumbnail.jp

A Systematic Literature Review of Sexual Harassment Studies with Text Mining

Sexual harassment has been the topic of thousands of research articles in the 20th and 21st centuries. Several review papers have been developed to synthesize the literature about sexual harassment. While traditional literature review studies provide valuable insights, these studies have some limitations including analyzing a limited number of papers, being time-consuming and labor-intensive, focusing on a few topics, and lacking temporal trend analysis. To address these limitations, this paper employs both computational and qualitative approaches to identify major research topics, explore temporal trends of sexual harassment topics over the past few decades, and point to future possible directions in sexual harassment studies. We collected 5320 research papers published between 1977 and 2020, identified and analyzed sexual harassment topics, and explored the temporal trend of topics. Our findings indicate that sexual harassment in the workplace was the most popular research theme, and sexual harassment was investigated in a wide range of spaces ranging from school to military settings. Our analysis shows that 62.5% of the topics having a significant trend had an increasing (hot) temporal trend that is expected to be studied more in the coming years. This study offers a bird’s eye view to better understand sexual harassment literature with text mining, qualitative, and temporal trend analysis methods. This research could be beneficial to researchers, educators, publishers, and policymakers by providing a broad overview of the sexual harassment field

Lynn Chamber Music Competition 2017

Judges Dr. Francesca Arnone Renate Falkner Joseph Robinson Winners (New York Prize) Fantasia Trio: David Brill (violin), Niki Khabbazvahed (cello), Guzal Ismetdinova (piano) Winners Concert on May 1, 2018 at Kosciuszko Foundation Winners (Miami Prize) Syzygy Wind Quintet: Emilio Ruttlant (flute), Trevor Mansell (oboe), James Abrahamson (clarinet), James Currence (horn), and Isaac Roles (bassoon)https://spiral.lynn.edu/conservatory_chamber-music-competition/1002/thumbnail.jp