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What determines the 'culture of silence'? : Disclosing and reporting sexual harassment among university employees and students at a large Swedish public university

Östergren, Per-Olof LU ; Canivet, Catarina LU ; Andersson, Ulrika LU and Agardh, Anette LU orcid (2025) In PLoS ONE 20(3).
Abstract

BACKGROUND: The MeToo-movement challenges the 'culture of silence' regarding sexual harassment (SH). There are few studies regarding this phenomenon in academic settings. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between having reported or disclosed SH, on the one hand, and background factors and general health and wellbeing of exposed individuals, types of SH and perpetrator characteristics, on the other hand.

METHODS AND RESULTS: A questionnaire sent to all employees and students at a large Swedish university was returned by 33% (N = 2736) and 32% (N = 9677), respectively. This study is based on the 469 employees and 2044 students who affirmed that they had been exposed to SH at the university. Analyses were made... (More)

BACKGROUND: The MeToo-movement challenges the 'culture of silence' regarding sexual harassment (SH). There are few studies regarding this phenomenon in academic settings. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between having reported or disclosed SH, on the one hand, and background factors and general health and wellbeing of exposed individuals, types of SH and perpetrator characteristics, on the other hand.

METHODS AND RESULTS: A questionnaire sent to all employees and students at a large Swedish university was returned by 33% (N = 2736) and 32% (N = 9677), respectively. This study is based on the 469 employees and 2044 students who affirmed that they had been exposed to SH at the university. Analyses were made by means of chi2 tests and logistic regression. Among employees, 38.8% had disclosed, i.e., talked to someone at the university about their experience, and 17.3% had formally reported, i.e., talked to someone at the university who had the obligation to act on this information. The corresponding figures among students were 11.2% and 4.0%. A higher professional rank was linked to lower disclosing and reporting behavior, although not statistically significantly. Among students, exposure to attempted or completed rape was linked to low rates of disclosing (24.3%) and reporting (8.1%). An asymmetrical power relationship was associated with higher rates of disclosing and reporting; although statistically significant for reporting only among employees, and for disclosing only among students. None of the health-related outcomes were related to disclosing or reporting.

CONCLUSIONS: The study confirmed a culture of silence regarding SH in the university setting. Several factors were linked to this, which can be associated with gendered and other power relations in society at large and in the academic setting in particular. Similar factors affected employees as well as students, but the culture of silence seemed more pronounced among students.

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Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
; ; and
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
Humans, Universities, Sexual Harassment/psychology, Female, Sweden, Students/psychology, Male, Adult, Surveys and Questionnaires, Young Adult, Disclosure, Middle Aged
in
PLoS ONE
volume
20
issue
3
article number
e0319407
publisher
Public Library of Science (PLoS)
external identifiers
  • scopus:105001184737
  • pmid:40138632
ISSN
1932-6203
DOI
10.1371/journal.pone.0319407
language
English
LU publication?
yes
additional info
Copyright: © 2025 Östergren et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
id
c24ac2e3-3580-495f-9cae-206bdd29506e
date added to LUP
2025-03-31 13:23:46
date last changed
2025-07-09 10:43:12
@article{c24ac2e3-3580-495f-9cae-206bdd29506e,
  abstract     = {{<p>BACKGROUND: The MeToo-movement challenges the 'culture of silence' regarding sexual harassment (SH). There are few studies regarding this phenomenon in academic settings. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between having reported or disclosed SH, on the one hand, and background factors and general health and wellbeing of exposed individuals, types of SH and perpetrator characteristics, on the other hand.</p><p>METHODS AND RESULTS: A questionnaire sent to all employees and students at a large Swedish university was returned by 33% (N = 2736) and 32% (N = 9677), respectively. This study is based on the 469 employees and 2044 students who affirmed that they had been exposed to SH at the university. Analyses were made by means of chi2 tests and logistic regression. Among employees, 38.8% had disclosed, i.e., talked to someone at the university about their experience, and 17.3% had formally reported, i.e., talked to someone at the university who had the obligation to act on this information. The corresponding figures among students were 11.2% and 4.0%. A higher professional rank was linked to lower disclosing and reporting behavior, although not statistically significantly. Among students, exposure to attempted or completed rape was linked to low rates of disclosing (24.3%) and reporting (8.1%). An asymmetrical power relationship was associated with higher rates of disclosing and reporting; although statistically significant for reporting only among employees, and for disclosing only among students. None of the health-related outcomes were related to disclosing or reporting.</p><p>CONCLUSIONS: The study confirmed a culture of silence regarding SH in the university setting. Several factors were linked to this, which can be associated with gendered and other power relations in society at large and in the academic setting in particular. Similar factors affected employees as well as students, but the culture of silence seemed more pronounced among students.</p>}},
  author       = {{Östergren, Per-Olof and Canivet, Catarina and Andersson, Ulrika and Agardh, Anette}},
  issn         = {{1932-6203}},
  keywords     = {{Humans; Universities; Sexual Harassment/psychology; Female; Sweden; Students/psychology; Male; Adult; Surveys and Questionnaires; Young Adult; Disclosure; Middle Aged}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  number       = {{3}},
  publisher    = {{Public Library of Science (PLoS)}},
  series       = {{PLoS ONE}},
  title        = {{What determines the 'culture of silence'? : Disclosing and reporting sexual harassment among university employees and students at a large Swedish public university}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0319407}},
  doi          = {{10.1371/journal.pone.0319407}},
  volume       = {{20}},
  year         = {{2025}},
}