Study of New Strategies to Combat Harassment in Engineering

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Researchers from New Mexico State University (NMSU) will implement an EHR Core Research (ECR) program research project. This ECR program supports work that advances fundamental research on STEM learning and learning environments, broadening participation in STEM, and STEM workforce development. The study will assess whether and how bystander intervention training - a successful approach in other contexts such as universities and the U.S. military - can be refined, adapted, and delivered to reduce sexual harassment and change institutional climates in engineering. The study will include two multi-method field studies. In the field studies, the researchers will engage engineering faculty as bystander trainers of their own students on two university campuses (NMSU and University of New Hampshire) to assess whether their involvement fosters greater commitment to combat harassment, as predicted by the Dobbin et al. managerial engagement approach to organizational change (2015). The proposed research will contribute to scientific knowledge about the components and conditions of effective norm-based strategies to reduce harassment and encourage bystander intervention in the engineering workplace.The researchers will use focus groups and surveys to explore the impact on faculty and students of their participation in providing bystander training as engineering faculty and receiving the training from engineering faculty as engineering students. The research is expected to inform strategies to combat harassment against vulnerable individuals which are typically underrepresented in engineering, such as engineers that are women, engineers of color, and LGBTQ engineers. The two campuses have significant enrollment of first generation and underrepresented minority students in engineering. The field studies will illustrate how to foster leaders' commitment to change engineering climates and how to modify the engineering professional curriculum to increase the retention of diverse individuals and their professional confidence. While this project is primarily funded by the ECR program, additional support has been provided by the Directorate for Engineering's Broadening Participation in Engineering (BPE) program.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.