Work-related sexual and gender harassment: conceptual challenges and the need for evidence-based prevention

Abstract

The topic of work-related sexual harassment has gained renewed attention in recent years following the public accounts of sexually harassing experiences – many of which were work-related – that emerged during the #MeToo movement beginning in October 2017 (1). The many testimonials from the movement illustrated the magnitude of the problem and put faces to the numbers of statistics on the topic. However, work-related sexual harassment is not a new phenomenon. In fact there are accounts of experiences that could be classified as sexual harassment in legal procedures dating back to at least the early 1900s (2). In labelling these experiences, feminist legal scholars MacKinnon (3) and Farley (4) introduced the term 'sexual harassment' in the late 1970s in the United States. The behaviors were considered unlawful when occurring in a work-setting and conducted or condoned by the employer. Since they negatively affected employment conditions of women, they were considered a violation of laws regarding equal rights between women and men (5). From the outset, sexual harassment was considered a legal rather than a working-conditions problem. Over time, it has become acknowledged also in the literature on working conditions, and recent studies have illustrated the salience of this exposure, showing increased risk of severe outcomes such as long-term sickness absence (6), depression (7), psychotropic treatment (8), alcohol-related morbidity and mortality (9), suicide and suicide attempt (10).