Don\u27t Walk Alone

Dont walk alone: The effect of the widely accepted behavior of street harassment on women’s mobility Sarah Hughes, School of Humanities and Life Sciences. Mentor: Bonnie Boaz ABSTRACT Women are continuously exposed to street harassment in their daily lives, however this issue lacks the recognition that it deserves as a societal problem. This paper explores to what extent men control public space and the effect that street harassment has on women both psychologically and physically. Data has been collected from scholarly articles as well as published studies. Unfortunately the research finds that society accepts the mistreatment of women through street harassment as a social norm due to the presence of male dominated institutions. Consequently women are forced to alter their behavior in order to accommodate the ideal of a male dominated public space. Women also face a diminished sense of self worth when exposed to continual harassment in public. In order to address the issue of street harassment society needs to develop a vocabulary to describe instances of street harassment in order to shed light on an issue that lacks recognition.https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/uresposters/1155/thumbnail.jp

Wolf Whistles and Creepy Compliments: How Safe Routes to School Programs Can Take Action to Protect Kids from Street Harassment

This report provides background on street harassment, discusses some potential approaches to addressing street harassment, and summarizes lessons from these approaches that may be applicable for Safe Routes to School programs.Street harassment can have a strong negative effect on students who are trying to get to school or home on foot, by bicycle, or on public transit. How do these unsolicited and often threatening comments and actions affect students? Experiences of street harassment can cause students to miss school, and can affect readiness to learn and academic success. They can lead students to avoid convenient, affordable, and healthy ways of getting to school, discouraging walking and taking transit. And, street harassment can affect students mentally, resulting in negative self-esteem and depression.

Unsafe and Harassed in Public Spaces: A National Street Harassment Report

From "hey baby" to "stupid fag," from flashing to groping, sexual harassment in public spaces, or "street harassment," is a problem many people experience, some with profound consequences. Since 2008, Stop Street Harassment (SSH) has collected thousands of street harassment stories. This groundbreaking study confirms what the stories suggest: Across all age, races, income levels, sexual orientations, and geographic locations, most women in the United States experience street harassment. Some men, especially men who identify as gay, bisexual, queer, or transgender, do as well.This report presents the findings of a 2,000-person, nationally representative survey (approximately 1,000 women and 1,000 men, ages 18 and up). GfK, a top surveying firm, conducted the Internet-based survey in February and March 2014. Additionally, SSH conducted 10 focus groups across the nation from August 2012 to March 2014.Street harassment is a human rights violation and a form of gender violence. It causes many harassed persons, especially women, to feel less safe in public places and limit their time there. It can also cause people emotional and psychological harm. Everyone deserves to be safe and free from harassment as they go about their day

Adolescents' experiences of street harassment: creating a typology and assessing the emotional impact

Purpose: Research examining young people's experiences of harassment has tended to focus on the school and digital environment. Despite street harassment being identified as a common experience for adult women, very few studies have explored adolescents' experiences of street harassment. Methodology: A person centred analytical approach, based on experienced reporting, was used to create a typology of street harassment. Reports of street harassment were received from 118 (68 female, 43 male, 7 no gender reported) 11- to 15-year-olds over a 6 to 8 week period. Findings: Cluster analysis revealed four distinct groups: "predominately verbal", "non-verbal/non-direct", "other incident", and "all forms". Young women and those in the "all forms" group reported experiencing greater negative emotions following the episode of street harassment. Young men were equally as likely as young women to report experiencing street harassment. Value: The findings uniquely highlight that adolescents experience distinct types of street harassment and some of which are associated with negative emotions

Investigating the Utility of the Film War Zone as a Component of a Street Harassment Prevention Program

Street harassment, the sexual harassment by strangers in public places, is a common experience shared by many women and has been linked with other forms of sexual victimization. The negative impact of street harassment, such as fear and behavior to avoid being harassed, points to the need for preventing the behavior. This study sought to determine whether the documentary-style film War Zone may be effective in impacting men’s attitudes toward street harassment, and whether the effectiveness of the film would depend on men’s hostility toward women and level of peer acceptance for street harassment. Findings do not support the effectiveness of War Zone as a component of street harassment prevention. However, the data does suggest that endorsement of hostile attitudes toward women predicts a lack of empathy, and that endorsement of hostile attitudes toward women, a lack of empathy, and peer acceptance of street harassment predict acceptance of street harassment

Conceptual understandings and prevalence of sexual harassment and street harassment

This resource sheet provides an overview of the existing research on women\u27s experiences of sexual harassment and street harassment. It also considers conceptual models of sexual violence that are inclusive of these experiences. Women\u27s experiences of street harassment and sexual harassment are focused on in this paper. It is acknowledged that men can also be the victims of this behaviour. However, street harassment and sexual harassment are highly gendered occurrences. Women are overwhelmingly the victims and men the perpetrators. The language adopted throughout this sesource sheet reflects this gendered reality. Further, the conceptual model of sexual violence discussed later in this publication (the continuum model of sexual violence) applies more specifically to women\u27s experiences of sexual violence across their life course. That is, women experience a broad range of sexual violence (ranging from the relatively "minor" to severe forms of sexual violation) at rates considerably higher than men. Further, while rates of victimisation remain relatively steady for women across their life course, rates of victimisation against men tend to decline across their life course.Key messages:Sexual violence, as a form of violence againt women needs to be conceptualised in a way that reflects women\u27s actual experiences, ranging from relatively "minor" forms of sexual violence through to sexual assault and rape.The harm of sexual violence is not always directly correlated with the perceived seriousness of the behaviour. Individual women experience forms of sexual violence differently. The context behaviour occurs in also plays a role in mediating its harm.All forms of sexual violence are interconnected, and are underpinned by the same social and cultural attitudes.Sexual harassment and street harassment are highly prevalent and common experiences for women. They are often not talked about and not taken seriously as harm (particularly street harassment).Sexual harassment and street harassment need to be included in policy and legislation targeted at preventing or responding to sexual violence.Information on current responses and disclosure mechanisms is also provided towards the end of this resource

Whistles Against Street Harassment (WASH)

As an urban university nestled in a bustling city, VCU is committed to having all members of the community feel safe in public spaces. The Whistles Against Street Harassment (WASH) initiative aims to improve the safety of our VCU community by (1) providing a whistle, a practical and easyto- use tool that the target or bystanders can use to disrupt street harassment, and (2) raising awareness and dialogue related to street harassment and public safety. RAINN defines street harassment as “unwanted comments, gestures, or acts directed at someone in a public space without their consent.”1 Street harassment is not limited to gender- or race-based intimidation; however, it negatively affects the entire community. In a recent web-based survey, VCU students, faculty, and staff identified the top safety interventions on the Monroe Park and MCV campuses to be pedestrian safety (33%), increased lighting (26%), addressing street harassment (25%), more police visibility in the evenings (25%) and additional patrols in VCU parking lots (20%).2 The WASH initiative aims to reduce, and ultimately eliminate, street harassment on our urban campuses

Tweeting the Gendered City: Analysis of Harassment, Reflections on Justice

Street harassment is a gender-based injustice experienced in public spaces. In this research, I draw on feminist perspectives and explore the stages of social movements to study how social media platform Twitter is used to share and process experiences with street harassment, pass along resources and media about street harassment, and to engage in anti-street harassment organizing and movement building activities. I detail a qualitative approach to social media research, introduce the concept of listening in Twitter-based research, and conclude with ideas for future research.</p

The Experience of Being Targets of Street Harassment in NYC: Preliminary Findings from a Qualitative Study Sample of 223 Voices who Hollaback!

Street harassment is an under-researched but likely prevalent experience for many New Yorkers. In partnership with Hollaback!, Cornell-ILR researchers sought to better understand how street harassment is experienced and the factors that influence its short- and long-term outcomes for those targeted by implementing a grounded qualitative study of descriptions of experiences of street harassment taking place in New York City submitted to the Hollaback! website between 2005 and 2008. In our report, we describe our findings and present a preliminary theoretical model of how street harassment is experience, as well as suggest some possible hypotheses for future study

"I don't want to be touched all the time" - Street Harassment and the Indian Woman: Qualitative exploration of street harassment through Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis and Dispositive Analysis

Street harassment is the gender-based sexual harassment of individuals in public spaces by strangers. Studies have shown that the majority of victims of street harassment are women and the perpetrators are men. Despite its serious implications on women’s quality of life and psychological well-being, street harassment remains an understudied area and has not been included in the wider ‘violence against women and girls’(VAWG) research and discourse. This research aimed to position street harassment as a distinct form of VAWG by exploring Indian women’s sense-making of their lived experiences of street harassment. The research was structured into two parts: Part 1 – The ‘Sociocultural Study’ implemented dispositive analysis of three recent Bollywood films of romantic genre to explore the construction of sociocultural discourses on Indian womanhood. Part 2 – The ‘Experiential Study’ explored the lived experiences of street harassment of adult Indian women by using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA). The participants included four single women (aged 25-35) and four mothers (aged 35-50) to teenage daughters. The Sociocultural Study provided the cultural context for the Experiential Study. The findings of the Sociocultural Study indicated that the concept of womanhood is constructed by the Indian male gaze—the virginal sanskari (traditional) Indian woman is considered the symbol of Indian womanhood, whereas the “westernised” vamp is the morally corrupt temptress of men. These patriarchal constructions were rooted in deeply ingrained sexism, sexual objectification, and rape myth acceptance, proposed as the ‘triad’ of core mediators of street harassment by this research. The ‘triad’ featured significantly in the meaning-making of the participants in the Experiential study. The participants interpreted their experiences in themes of disempowerment, emotional isolation, loss of sense of agency, identity conflicts, and stress in family relationships. The findings aligned with UN’s definition of ‘violence against women’. Recommendations for future research include better theoretical developments to explain street harassment; investigation of potential long-term effects of street harassment in women such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD); designing studies with more male participants to explore an ‘insider’ view into harassment; and finally, development of new standardised quantitative instruments to measure various aspects of street harassment