2003 IMTA Proceedings - International Military Testing Association

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Although less is known about male responses to sexual harassment this result seems
logical in that one would expect individuals who experience more harassment and more frequent
harassment to be more likely to report that behavior. As with the female sample, however, the
comparison between the Complete Reporters and the Partial Reporters that is somewhat more
ambiguous. In comparison to the Complete Reporters, the men in the Partial Reporters group are
more likely to report experience more frequent harassment and less likely to report being
harassed by a supervisor or multiple supervisors. Perhaps while the harassment is less frequent
for men in the Complete Reporters group than in the Partial Reporters group it is the recognition
of the harassment perpetrated by a supervisor that is identified by the target as worthy of
reporting. Whereas for the Partial Reporters it is the frequency with which a behavior occurs that
results in the behavior being reported. The implication is that men in the Partial Reporting
category appear to have the most severe experience of harassment in terms of
at least frequency of harassment.
The original sample was later split into two groups in order to better understand
the impact of combining individuals in the Partial Reporters groups with either the Non-reporters
or Complete Reporters on our interpretation and understanding of the determinants of reporting
sexual harassment. Individuals who reported none of the harassment they experienced comprised
the Non-reporters group and individuals who reported some or all of the harassment that
occurred to them were placed in the Reporters group. As with the previous analyses, Multinomial
Logistic Regressions 8 were run separately for women and men on both the developmental and
confirmatory samples using the same set of initial variables. Only those variables that, when
alone in the model, resulted in significant (≤.05) or marginally significant (≤ .15) differentiation
between the two groups were kept in the model for inclusion in testing using the confirmatory
sample 9 .
Comparison between the Non-reporters and Reporters in the confirmatory 2-group female
sample resulted in two significant differentiating variables (see Figure 3). When compared to the
Non-reporters, Reporters were more likely to endorse experiencing sexist behaviors and sexual
coercion. Intuitively this appears correct in that the more one experiences these types of negative
behaviors the more likely one would be to report them. However, in light of the findings in the 3group
female sample it becomes clear that a dichotomous based analysis provides a molar view
of the phenomena on reporting rather than a deeper molecular understanding. Not only does the
2-group analysis fail to provide us with much more than is already accessible through common
sense it also confounds our understanding of the role these two variables, sexist behavior and
sexual coercion, play in reporting sexual harassment.
Sexist Behavior
● Non-Reporters < Reporters
Sexual Coercion
8 Multinomial Logistic Regression was utilized instead of (Binomial) Logistic Regression for comparative purposes.
Use of this method should not alter the results or interpretation of the analyses.
9 Despite significance results Gender Harassment, a combination of sexual and sexist behaviors, is omitted from the
training sample results and confirmatory sample model due to its redundancy and the author’s interest in
understanding its components.
45 th Annual Conference of the International Military Testing Association
Pensacola, Florida, 3-6 November 2003