Sexual Harassment of Undergraduate Students in STEM: Exploring the Role of Student and Faculty/Staff Perpetrators on Sense of Belonging and Academic Outcomes.

Summary: Sexual harassment is a major problem for college students studying science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). This study looked at who is causing the harassment and how it hurts students. Researchers found that about 60% of students faced harassment from other students (peers), and 46% faced it from teachers or staff.

When teachers or staff were the harassers, students usually tried to ignore it instead of reporting it. Both types of harassment made students feel like they had less support in school. However, harassment from peers made students feel like they didn't belong, while harassment from teachers made them want to drop out of college altogether.