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The Inner Battle


“However, Pina and Gannon (2012), who reviewed the literature on victims' responses to sexual harassment, suggested that there are four general types of coping responses: formal reports, informal complaints, social support strategies, and attempts to communicate with the harasser. The review revealed that the coping strategy most commonly reported in the literature was seeking support from friends and co-workers, but only support from friends was shown to be helpful. The reviewers suggested that workers might prefer to rely on their close personal network for support because co-workers might be doubtful or dismissive about the harassment.”


Cortina and Wasti (2005) examined sexual harassment coping behavior in four groups: working-class Hispanic Americans, working-class Anglo Americans, professional Turks, and professional Anglo Americans. The review revealed three common coping patterns: avoidant negotiating, support seeking, and detached. The avoidant negotiating pattern involved high levels of denial and avoidance coupled with attempts to negotiate with the harasser in order to curtail the behavior. The support seeking pattern involved seeking informal support from friends or formal support from management. The detached pattern involved denying the severity of the harassment and doing little to cope with it.”

The problem with harassment cases in professional contexts is the willingness of the woman employees to report it. They might feel discouraged to report anything due to the fact that further action is not likely to be taken. In a study by Pai and Lee in 2011, it was found that 57.5% of the participants reported no further action was taken after the nurse reported an incident of sexual harassment to the manager or other staff member. If this is the case in a study that is covering a range of nationalities, it is fair to say women have a tendency to instead use a coping mechanism to deal with their feelings after the harassment instead of going to authorities. Some of the women are more afraid of the consequences that might ensue if they come forward with this information. For instance the fear of being fired for reporting their boss to the authorities. Others felt that they were too ashamed to report. Some women even claimed that harassment isn't worth reporting because it is implied with the job description and it “isn't important” and won't be productive or beneficial to report. Even sadder, yet, over 50% of women were unsure of who to even report the harassment to. Unfortunately despite many feminist activist movements these feelings remain true amongst modern women and have yet to be resolved. These negative associations towards the harassment and what might happen to their positions instill fear in these powerful women, and consequently continue to prolong these disappointing actions done by men and other employees. They are not getting reprimanded properly, because women are not reporting the incidents or reporting them too late, which derails the evidence.

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