Sexual harassment in academia: a hazard to women's health.

Universities and colleges have for a long time ignored sexual harassment, hoped it was non-existent or waited for it to disappear. Recently, however, students, professors and university administrators have begun to recognize the perniciousness and pervasiveness of the problem but thus far with little attention to sexual harassment as a health hazard. Based on data collected by questionnaire from 455 women university undergraduate and graduate students and nine follow-up in-depth interviews, this study examines the dimensions and dynamics of sexual harassment as a health hazard for women. Sexual harassment is found to have both direct and indirect health effects, including nausea and sleeplessness, loss of self-esteem, fear and anger, feelings of helplessness and isolation, as well as nervousness and depression. In contributing to the literature on women's culturally and socially determined health problems, this study sheds light on the ways in which women students' economic, political, social and personal well-being can be undermined by sexual harassment.