Culture change is key to reducing sexual harassment in academia, report says

Sexual harassment is pushing researchers out of science and medicine, says a new report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, and combating the problem requires systemwide changes at colleges and universities.

The report, released 12 June, describes settings that are conducive to harassment, particularly those in which the leadership or overall demographics are male dominated and ones in which the work is considered atypical for women. It lays out 15 recommendations—many of them with multiple parts—for institutions to improve their culture and climate so that sexual harassment is perceived as unacceptable. “If you care about advancing science, engineering, and medicine, you must care about the impact of sexual harassment,” said MIT’s Sheila Widnall, cochair of the 21-member report committee, at a press conference in Washington, DC.

Members of the committee emphasized that to implement meaningful change, institutions need to focus on bettering the work environment rather than on simply adhering to legal guidelines. “The law is a floor, not a ceiling, for what an institution can do,” said committee member Lilia Cortina, professor of psychology and women’s studies at the University of Michigan.

The report defines three categories of sexual harassment: gender harassment, which takes the form of “verbal and nonverbal behaviors that convey hostility, objectification, exclusion, or second-class status about members of one gender”; unwanted sexual attention, including sexual assault; and sexual coercion—for example, being told “sleep with me or I’m going to fire you.”

Coercion is the rarest form of sexual harassment; gender harassment is the most common. “Most of the time, it’s a put-down, not a come-on,” Cortina said at the press conference. But she added that repeated, ongoing gender harassment can be as harmful to women as isolated cases of sexual coercion. And harassment drags down not only the direct targets but also others who witness the hostile treatment or see that perpetrators often do not face consequences.

The report cites a recent survey conducted by the University of Texas system in which about 20% of female students in science, more than 25% in engineering, and in excess of 40% in medicine said they had experienced sexual harassment from faculty or staff. According to the report, “Other survey data reveal similarly high rates of sexual harassment of students and faculty in our colleges and universities.… It appears women are often bullied or harassed out of career pathways in these fields.”

To begin to address the problem, the National Academies report says colleges and universities should take steps to create diverse, inclusive, and respectful environments. The representation of women at every level of hierarchy should be improved. To diffuse power relations, institutions should consider mentoring networks, committee-based advising, and department-based funding; such arrangements would reduce the dependence of students on a single, powerful adviser.

The majority of harassment cases are never formally reported because victims fear retribution and damage to their career prospects. Alternative, less formal ways of reporting sexual harassment should be developed, the report recommends. One approach is Callisto , a platform in use at 13 institutions, through which targets of sexual harassment can anonymously report incidents. Reports can be cross-checked to help detect serial assailants. Moreover, investigations and accountability should be improved and made more transparent.

Training programs to prevent sexual harassment should focus on changing behavior, not on changing beliefs, the report says. And institutions should specify the consequences for behavioral transgressions. NSF recently implemented a policy that requires universities that receive its funding to report findings of harassment; punishments include removing researchers from grants and permanently barring scientists from applying for future grants.

The academies themselves are wrestling with how to deal with members who are found to be sexual harassers. Among those harassers are astronomer Geoffrey Marcy and cancer researcher Inder Verma, who both quit their faculty positions but remain members of the National Academy of Sciences. Should harassers be stripped of membership? “We are looking at this in a comprehensive manner” was the vague answer offered by National Academies executive officer Bruce Darling at the report’s unveiling.

In prerecorded remarks, National Academy of Sciences president Marcia McNutt called the report a “landmark.” In light of the #MeToo movement, it is being released at the right moment in history to confront the issues and take action, she said.