Hayes et al. (Reference Hayes, Kaylor and Oltman2020) raised the million-dollar question in the midst of the #metoo movement: Why has antidiscrimination/harassment training to date been mostly ineffective? They contended that this is likely a reflection of misalignment among training content, goals, and effectiveness criteria. They proposed adopting novel perspectives beyond traditional applied psychology theories to refocus both research and practical efforts to tackle this all-important issue. Although we commend the vast array of perspectives and associated research questions raised by the authors, one factor that also merits consideration is the degree to which existing antidiscrimination/harassment training representatively and accurately reflects the daily occurrences in the workplace. Specifically, we believe that current sexual harassment (SH) training often portrays these issues to be gender specific (i.e., heterosexual men harassing heterosexual women), and such misrepresentation is likely to impact trainees’ attitudes and training transfer negatively. In this commentary, we draw from intersectional research on SH and the training literature to argue that current training should represent a more extensive set of minorities whose intersecting stigmatized identities make them especially vulnerable to SH. Furthermore, although we acknowledge that SH is a specific manifestation of discrimination, we are focusing our discussion on SH because this is often a separate category of training in both research literature and organizational settings while operating under some of the similar mechanisms as discrimination.
Sexual harassment—who else besides (White) women?
The typical portrayal of SH tends to be heterosexual (and often White) women being harassed by heterosexual men; hence, SH is primarily viewed as a women-specific and sexual-desire–driven problem. Indeed, women make up a considerable portion of harassment victims, and they also tend to report more cases of SH than men do (Quick & McFadyen, Reference Quick and McFadyen2017). According to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, in 2011, 83.7% of the sexual harassment claims were made by women (EEOC, n.d.). Additionally, survey work examining firefighters found 84.7% of women were treated differently because of their sex, and 30.2% of women experienced sexual advances in the workplace (Hulett et al., Reference Hulett, Bendick, Thomas and Moccio2008). However, this is an oversimplification of the reality of the issue: Women are not the only gender being harassed. The intersection of one’s gender with other stigmatized social identities (e.g., race, sexual orientation) can further exacerbate the degree to which he or she is harassed. Sex-based harassment (SBH), as proposed by Berdahl (Reference Berdahl2007), is a more accurate, inclusive portrayal of the issue. Traditional SH tends to frame harassment as prompted by sexual desire; however, SBH frames harassment as based on the power to protect one’s sex-based status and to withhold a standard of norms and behavior (Berdahl, Reference Berdahl2007). SBH broadens the definition to include any behaviors of degradation based on an individual’s sex to display power and preserve social status (Berdahl, Reference Berdahl2007), which captures an array of potential harassment incidents affecting minority women, LGBT individuals, and men that we will discuss below.
Because people are defined by a multitude of social identities, their experiences can significantly differ if more than one of their identities is stigmatized (Crenshaw, Reference Crenshaw1991). Notably, minority women may be particularly susceptible to harassment because of the “double jeopardy” posed by their race and gender. Although research on SBH experienced by minority women to date has been scarce, the limited evidence seems to support this notion. Research suggests that Black women experience SBH more often than White women (Buchanan et al., Reference Buchanan, Bergman, Bruce, Woods and Lichty2009). More so, Black women perceive cross-racial SBH (White man sexually harassing a Black woman) to be more threatening and degrading than intraracial SBH (Black man sexually harassing a Black woman; Berdahl & Moore, Reference Berdahl and Moore2006; Bergman & Drasgow, Reference Bergman and Drasgow2003; Cortina et al., Reference Cortina, Swan, Fitzgerald and Waldo1998; Kalof et al., Reference Kalof, Eby, Matheson and Kroska2001). Collectively, this body of evidence suggests that not all women experience SBH equally.
Another marginalized group that is particularly vulnerable to workplace SBH is the LGBT community. Although rarely studied, a few studies have found supporting evidence that LGBT individuals experience SBH and sexual assault more often than heterosexual individuals do, yet they are not reported as often because of intrinsic stigma associated with their sexual orientation/gender identity (Quick & McFadyen, Reference Quick and McFadyen2017; Smith et al., Reference Smith, Cunningham and Freyd2016). LGBT individuals often experience SBH early in their lives, starting at grade school and continuing into adulthood as they enter the workforce (McFarland & Dupuis, Reference McFarland and Dupuis2001). Besides suffering from stereotyping and gender discrimination in mainstream society, nonheterosexual employees endure SBH and other types of mistreatment even in “gay-friendly” workplaces (Giuffre et al., Reference Giuffre, Dellinger and Williams2008). In addition to the fear of retaliation and stigma associated with harassment that heterosexual people experience, LGBT employees must be concerned with disclosure and discrimination specific to their sexual orientation/gender identity, which often leads to detrimental effects on their mental health, workplace productivity, and job satisfaction (Sears & Mallory, Reference Sears and Mallory2011).
Finally, even though the stereotypical portrayal of SBH puts heterosexual men in the harasser position, statistics and research indicate that they can be victims of harassment as well. A national study on sexual harassment and assault found that 43% of men have experienced some form of sexual harassment at least once in their lifetime (“Measuring #MeToo”, 2019), and such abuse is beyond the “good-natured horseplay” often used to justify same-sex harassment among men (Alonso, 2018). Because SBH is a means to display power and dominance, harassment incidents against men are usually attempts to reinforce standards of masculinity and exert power (Berdahl, Reference Berdahl2007). Despite its prevalence and equally detrimental effects, SBH against men continues to be trivialized (Gutek, Reference Gutek1985) for several reasons. First, behaviors identified as harassing are generally perceived differently by men compared to women (Berdahl et al., Reference Berdahl, Magley and Waldo1996). With greater emphasis on traditional masculinity and testing of one’s ability to endure hazing rituals in many male-dominated organizations (Brodsky, Reference Brodsky1976; Collinson, Reference Collinson1988), it is unorthodox for a man to report SH. Mainstream society often emphasizes heterosexual hypermasculinity and shuns male same-sex SBH (Stockdale et al., Reference Stockdale, Visio and Batra1999). Accordingly, men experiencing same-sex SBH suffer more severe consequences than men harassed by women (DuBois et al., Reference Dubois, Knapp, Faley and Kustis1998) because reporting cases of same-sex SH is more likely to be seen as embarrassing as a result of deviating from stereotypical manly behaviors. Altogether, contrary to the popular notion of harassment, the provided evidence suggests that SBH affects more than just heterosexual, White women. Next, we will examine the degree to which existing SBH training reflects these nuances of the issues.
Are organizations adapting with the time?
Given the complexity of organizational harassment issues and the need for greater inclusivity, are organizations adapting their training programs to keep up? Based on Tippett’s (Reference Tippett2018) overview of SH training programs in organizations from 1980 to 2016, it appears training has mostly remained unchanged over time, with only minor changes such as adding new legal terminology where needed. According to Tippett, a typical SH training video includes an authority figure giving a summary of the legal rules and offering advice on how to report cases of SBH, with an emphasis on legal compliance rather than the nature and impact of SBH. One reason that organizations have yet to update their SH training is because they prefer basic training that is easily recognizable to their employees (Tippett, Reference Tippett2018). Companies are not incentivized to change their training because SH training is provided to employees to protect employers from legal disputes (Tinkler, Reference Tinkler2012).
According to a recent interdisciplinary review on SH training, SH training is reported to be legally effective if it (a) meets minimum legal requirements for organization-provided SH training, (b) reduces external SH legal claims filed against the company, (c) increases the organization’s ability to defeat a claim successfully, and (d) reduces what the company is required to pay if the claim is successful (Roehling & Huang, Reference Roehling and Huang2018). Given this information, it makes sense why organizations are incentivized to do the legal minimum and implement only basic training. Consequently, external vendors are left demotivated to provide updated material, knowing that companies prefer conventional modules. These two factors play a part in explaining the stagnation in the innovation of SH training.
Looking at SBH merely as a legal issue is an excessively narrow view. SBH is an ethical issue that concerns social-sexual behavior at work (Bowes-Sperry & Powell, Reference Bowes-Sperry and Powell1999), meaning its occurrence (or lack thereof) depends heavily on a shared sense of moral norms by the organization. Perhaps even more so than other types of task-based training, SBH training content needs to accurately reflect the social reality of the issue beyond the vague legal definitions in order to gauge the attention of the trainees (i.e., regular employees). For example, California has recently adjusted its laws for government-mandated SBH training to address harassment based on sexual orientation and gender identity or expression, while also providing practical examples of these types of harassment (“California Department of Fair Employment and Housing,” n.d.). We endorse this policy as it is a sensible way to address the problem of diversity noninvasively. SBH training content should be updated to include more minority representation to reflect the different manifestations of SBH. Next, we will draw from training literature to explain how increasing the representation of SBH training can facilitate training outcomes, given that SH training can improve worker’s behavior (Monroe et al., Reference Monroe, Choi, Howell, Lampros-Monroe, Trejo and Perez2014).
How does representation in harassment training content improve training outcomes?
Obtaining a sustained positive change after delivering SH training is significantly more difficult than procedural or skill-based training. SH training addresses skills (i.e., open skills) that are not directly related to the job role and sometimes elicit emotional responses, whereas procedural or skill-based training addresses skills (i.e., closed skills) and procedures directly related to the job. These unique characteristics of SH awareness training make the limitations in transfer of training, discussed in the following paragraphs, even more salient. We argue that having representative SBH content is crucial to training success to keep trainees engaged during training, to approach both new and old SBH training positively, and to promote the transfer of training.
First, to maximize the transfer of SBH training, the content presented during training must be representative of and applicable to the real workplace. One reaction to training, reaction to content validity, refers to the degree to which trainees (i.e., regular employees) believe that material delivered during training is representative of the actual job context (Bates, Reference Bates1997). Trainees need to engage with realistic content during training for the training experience to have useful and positive implications once they return to work. Upon post-training, trainees should be able to draw upon their training experience to perform and utilize newly learned skills and behaviors. If there is no need to retrieve information presented during training, then trainees may have adverse reactions to training and not perceive the experience as useful. Content validity is positively related to performance utility. In other words, the degree to which training material is viewed as representative or not is related to how much trainees think their training experience facilitates workplace performance (Bates, Reference Bates1997). If SBH materials presented during training are not perceived as realistic interpersonal interactions that employees may experience, then perceptions of content validity are threatened. The likeliness of positive changes in behaviors or attitudes would in turn radically diminish. Consistent with our argument of organizations being more mindful of the content presented during training, McKillip (Reference McKillip2001) suggests that high content validity of training is contingent upon crucial components being implemented in training while keeping the training material free of any trivial components. To achieve this, organizations should approach training needs more diligently. Training designers should clearly articulate the spectrum of inappropriate behaviors and attitudes present on the job in order to devise a successful design and delivery of training.
Aside from attitudes toward the content delivered in training, attitudes toward SBH training, in general, are essential factors that must be accepted positively. Specifically, organizations must consider that an employee’s first experience with SBH training is a moment in which critical perceptions are formed that have downstream motivational consequences for future training. If trainees do not perceive an initial training course to be useful, then they will experience declined motivation during the following training experiences (Sitzmann et al., Reference Sitzmann, Brown, Ely and Kraiger2009) . A poorly designed SBH training with content that is outdated, not analogous to real-world manifestations of SBH, or fails to represent different populations equally may negatively impact perceptions and attitudes toward other future SBH training. Even if trainees experience a thoroughly designed and well delivered SBH training in the future, the potential for a successful transfer of training is diminished before training begins due to attitudes formed during prior negative SBH training experiences. Additionally, when organizations incorporate representative content into the training experience, this may signal to their employees that the organization values the psychological safety of all individuals within the organization.
Conclusion
Extending ideas proposed by Hayes et al. (Reference Hayes, Kaylor and Oltman2020), we argued that the current lack of success in harassment training could be partially attributed to the discrepancy between the training content and real-world manifestations of harassment behaviors. Beyond the typical heterosexual man harassing White woman scenario portrayed in most organizational training, SBH affects different minority groups and heterosexual men differently. We contend that in order to maximize training transfer, it is essential that organizations first gain a holistic view of workplace harassment and incorporate that into their training content. Only then can organizations truly leverage value from SBH training and make substantive progress with the existing workplace harassment problem.
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Hayes et al. (Reference Hayes, Kaylor and Oltman2020) raised the million-dollar question in the midst of the #metoo movement: Why has antidiscrimination/harassment training to date been mostly ineffective? They contended that this is likely a reflection of misalignment among training content, goals, and effectiveness criteria. They proposed adopting novel perspectives beyond traditional applied psychology theories to refocus both research and practical efforts to tackle this all-important issue. Although we commend the vast array of perspectives and associated research questions raised by the authors, one factor that also merits consideration is the degree to which existing antidiscrimination/harassment training representatively and accurately reflects the daily occurrences in the workplace. Specifically, we believe that current sexual harassment (SH) training often portrays these issues to be gender specific (i.e., heterosexual men harassing heterosexual women), and such misrepresentation is likely to impact trainees’ attitudes and training transfer negatively. In this commentary, we draw from intersectional research on SH and the training literature to argue that current training should represent a more extensive set of minorities whose intersecting stigmatized identities make them especially vulnerable to SH. Furthermore, although we acknowledge that SH is a specific manifestation of discrimination, we are focusing our discussion on SH because this is often a separate category of training in both research literature and organizational settings while operating under some of the similar mechanisms as discrimination.
Sexual harassment—who else besides (White) women?
The typical portrayal of SH tends to be heterosexual (and often White) women being harassed by heterosexual men; hence, SH is primarily viewed as a women-specific and sexual-desire–driven problem. Indeed, women make up a considerable portion of harassment victims, and they also tend to report more cases of SH than men do (Quick & McFadyen, Reference Quick and McFadyen2017). According to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, in 2011, 83.7% of the sexual harassment claims were made by women (EEOC, n.d.). Additionally, survey work examining firefighters found 84.7% of women were treated differently because of their sex, and 30.2% of women experienced sexual advances in the workplace (Hulett et al., Reference Hulett, Bendick, Thomas and Moccio2008). However, this is an oversimplification of the reality of the issue: Women are not the only gender being harassed. The intersection of one’s gender with other stigmatized social identities (e.g., race, sexual orientation) can further exacerbate the degree to which he or she is harassed. Sex-based harassment (SBH), as proposed by Berdahl (Reference Berdahl2007), is a more accurate, inclusive portrayal of the issue. Traditional SH tends to frame harassment as prompted by sexual desire; however, SBH frames harassment as based on the power to protect one’s sex-based status and to withhold a standard of norms and behavior (Berdahl, Reference Berdahl2007). SBH broadens the definition to include any behaviors of degradation based on an individual’s sex to display power and preserve social status (Berdahl, Reference Berdahl2007), which captures an array of potential harassment incidents affecting minority women, LGBT individuals, and men that we will discuss below.
Because people are defined by a multitude of social identities, their experiences can significantly differ if more than one of their identities is stigmatized (Crenshaw, Reference Crenshaw1991). Notably, minority women may be particularly susceptible to harassment because of the “double jeopardy” posed by their race and gender. Although research on SBH experienced by minority women to date has been scarce, the limited evidence seems to support this notion. Research suggests that Black women experience SBH more often than White women (Buchanan et al., Reference Buchanan, Bergman, Bruce, Woods and Lichty2009). More so, Black women perceive cross-racial SBH (White man sexually harassing a Black woman) to be more threatening and degrading than intraracial SBH (Black man sexually harassing a Black woman; Berdahl & Moore, Reference Berdahl and Moore2006; Bergman & Drasgow, Reference Bergman and Drasgow2003; Cortina et al., Reference Cortina, Swan, Fitzgerald and Waldo1998; Kalof et al., Reference Kalof, Eby, Matheson and Kroska2001). Collectively, this body of evidence suggests that not all women experience SBH equally.
Another marginalized group that is particularly vulnerable to workplace SBH is the LGBT community. Although rarely studied, a few studies have found supporting evidence that LGBT individuals experience SBH and sexual assault more often than heterosexual individuals do, yet they are not reported as often because of intrinsic stigma associated with their sexual orientation/gender identity (Quick & McFadyen, Reference Quick and McFadyen2017; Smith et al., Reference Smith, Cunningham and Freyd2016). LGBT individuals often experience SBH early in their lives, starting at grade school and continuing into adulthood as they enter the workforce (McFarland & Dupuis, Reference McFarland and Dupuis2001). Besides suffering from stereotyping and gender discrimination in mainstream society, nonheterosexual employees endure SBH and other types of mistreatment even in “gay-friendly” workplaces (Giuffre et al., Reference Giuffre, Dellinger and Williams2008). In addition to the fear of retaliation and stigma associated with harassment that heterosexual people experience, LGBT employees must be concerned with disclosure and discrimination specific to their sexual orientation/gender identity, which often leads to detrimental effects on their mental health, workplace productivity, and job satisfaction (Sears & Mallory, Reference Sears and Mallory2011).
Finally, even though the stereotypical portrayal of SBH puts heterosexual men in the harasser position, statistics and research indicate that they can be victims of harassment as well. A national study on sexual harassment and assault found that 43% of men have experienced some form of sexual harassment at least once in their lifetime (“Measuring #MeToo”, 2019), and such abuse is beyond the “good-natured horseplay” often used to justify same-sex harassment among men (Alonso, 2018). Because SBH is a means to display power and dominance, harassment incidents against men are usually attempts to reinforce standards of masculinity and exert power (Berdahl, Reference Berdahl2007). Despite its prevalence and equally detrimental effects, SBH against men continues to be trivialized (Gutek, Reference Gutek1985) for several reasons. First, behaviors identified as harassing are generally perceived differently by men compared to women (Berdahl et al., Reference Berdahl, Magley and Waldo1996). With greater emphasis on traditional masculinity and testing of one’s ability to endure hazing rituals in many male-dominated organizations (Brodsky, Reference Brodsky1976; Collinson, Reference Collinson1988), it is unorthodox for a man to report SH. Mainstream society often emphasizes heterosexual hypermasculinity and shuns male same-sex SBH (Stockdale et al., Reference Stockdale, Visio and Batra1999). Accordingly, men experiencing same-sex SBH suffer more severe consequences than men harassed by women (DuBois et al., Reference Dubois, Knapp, Faley and Kustis1998) because reporting cases of same-sex SH is more likely to be seen as embarrassing as a result of deviating from stereotypical manly behaviors. Altogether, contrary to the popular notion of harassment, the provided evidence suggests that SBH affects more than just heterosexual, White women. Next, we will examine the degree to which existing SBH training reflects these nuances of the issues.
Are organizations adapting with the time?
Given the complexity of organizational harassment issues and the need for greater inclusivity, are organizations adapting their training programs to keep up? Based on Tippett’s (Reference Tippett2018) overview of SH training programs in organizations from 1980 to 2016, it appears training has mostly remained unchanged over time, with only minor changes such as adding new legal terminology where needed. According to Tippett, a typical SH training video includes an authority figure giving a summary of the legal rules and offering advice on how to report cases of SBH, with an emphasis on legal compliance rather than the nature and impact of SBH. One reason that organizations have yet to update their SH training is because they prefer basic training that is easily recognizable to their employees (Tippett, Reference Tippett2018). Companies are not incentivized to change their training because SH training is provided to employees to protect employers from legal disputes (Tinkler, Reference Tinkler2012).
According to a recent interdisciplinary review on SH training, SH training is reported to be legally effective if it (a) meets minimum legal requirements for organization-provided SH training, (b) reduces external SH legal claims filed against the company, (c) increases the organization’s ability to defeat a claim successfully, and (d) reduces what the company is required to pay if the claim is successful (Roehling & Huang, Reference Roehling and Huang2018). Given this information, it makes sense why organizations are incentivized to do the legal minimum and implement only basic training. Consequently, external vendors are left demotivated to provide updated material, knowing that companies prefer conventional modules. These two factors play a part in explaining the stagnation in the innovation of SH training.
Looking at SBH merely as a legal issue is an excessively narrow view. SBH is an ethical issue that concerns social-sexual behavior at work (Bowes-Sperry & Powell, Reference Bowes-Sperry and Powell1999), meaning its occurrence (or lack thereof) depends heavily on a shared sense of moral norms by the organization. Perhaps even more so than other types of task-based training, SBH training content needs to accurately reflect the social reality of the issue beyond the vague legal definitions in order to gauge the attention of the trainees (i.e., regular employees). For example, California has recently adjusted its laws for government-mandated SBH training to address harassment based on sexual orientation and gender identity or expression, while also providing practical examples of these types of harassment (“California Department of Fair Employment and Housing,” n.d.). We endorse this policy as it is a sensible way to address the problem of diversity noninvasively. SBH training content should be updated to include more minority representation to reflect the different manifestations of SBH. Next, we will draw from training literature to explain how increasing the representation of SBH training can facilitate training outcomes, given that SH training can improve worker’s behavior (Monroe et al., Reference Monroe, Choi, Howell, Lampros-Monroe, Trejo and Perez2014).
How does representation in harassment training content improve training outcomes?
Obtaining a sustained positive change after delivering SH training is significantly more difficult than procedural or skill-based training. SH training addresses skills (i.e., open skills) that are not directly related to the job role and sometimes elicit emotional responses, whereas procedural or skill-based training addresses skills (i.e., closed skills) and procedures directly related to the job. These unique characteristics of SH awareness training make the limitations in transfer of training, discussed in the following paragraphs, even more salient. We argue that having representative SBH content is crucial to training success to keep trainees engaged during training, to approach both new and old SBH training positively, and to promote the transfer of training.
First, to maximize the transfer of SBH training, the content presented during training must be representative of and applicable to the real workplace. One reaction to training, reaction to content validity, refers to the degree to which trainees (i.e., regular employees) believe that material delivered during training is representative of the actual job context (Bates, Reference Bates1997). Trainees need to engage with realistic content during training for the training experience to have useful and positive implications once they return to work. Upon post-training, trainees should be able to draw upon their training experience to perform and utilize newly learned skills and behaviors. If there is no need to retrieve information presented during training, then trainees may have adverse reactions to training and not perceive the experience as useful. Content validity is positively related to performance utility. In other words, the degree to which training material is viewed as representative or not is related to how much trainees think their training experience facilitates workplace performance (Bates, Reference Bates1997). If SBH materials presented during training are not perceived as realistic interpersonal interactions that employees may experience, then perceptions of content validity are threatened. The likeliness of positive changes in behaviors or attitudes would in turn radically diminish. Consistent with our argument of organizations being more mindful of the content presented during training, McKillip (Reference McKillip2001) suggests that high content validity of training is contingent upon crucial components being implemented in training while keeping the training material free of any trivial components. To achieve this, organizations should approach training needs more diligently. Training designers should clearly articulate the spectrum of inappropriate behaviors and attitudes present on the job in order to devise a successful design and delivery of training.
Aside from attitudes toward the content delivered in training, attitudes toward SBH training, in general, are essential factors that must be accepted positively. Specifically, organizations must consider that an employee’s first experience with SBH training is a moment in which critical perceptions are formed that have downstream motivational consequences for future training. If trainees do not perceive an initial training course to be useful, then they will experience declined motivation during the following training experiences (Sitzmann et al., Reference Sitzmann, Brown, Ely and Kraiger2009) . A poorly designed SBH training with content that is outdated, not analogous to real-world manifestations of SBH, or fails to represent different populations equally may negatively impact perceptions and attitudes toward other future SBH training. Even if trainees experience a thoroughly designed and well delivered SBH training in the future, the potential for a successful transfer of training is diminished before training begins due to attitudes formed during prior negative SBH training experiences. Additionally, when organizations incorporate representative content into the training experience, this may signal to their employees that the organization values the psychological safety of all individuals within the organization.
Conclusion
Extending ideas proposed by Hayes et al. (Reference Hayes, Kaylor and Oltman2020), we argued that the current lack of success in harassment training could be partially attributed to the discrepancy between the training content and real-world manifestations of harassment behaviors. Beyond the typical heterosexual man harassing White woman scenario portrayed in most organizational training, SBH affects different minority groups and heterosexual men differently. We contend that in order to maximize training transfer, it is essential that organizations first gain a holistic view of workplace harassment and incorporate that into their training content. Only then can organizations truly leverage value from SBH training and make substantive progress with the existing workplace harassment problem.