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Women Higher Education Students’ Experiences of Sexual Violence: A Scoping Review and Thematic Synthesis of Qualitative Studies

Sexual violence (SV) against women is common in higher education settings, causing serious harm to the health, well-being, and academic outcomes of victim/survivors. There have been numerous systematic reviews of the quantitative evidence on this topic, highlighting the prevalence, health impacts, a...

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Autores principales: Tarzia, Laura, Henderson-Brooks, Katrina, Baloch, Surriya, Hegarty, Kelsey
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: SAGE Publications 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10666468/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37036144
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/15248380231162976
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author Tarzia, Laura
Henderson-Brooks, Katrina
Baloch, Surriya
Hegarty, Kelsey
author_facet Tarzia, Laura
Henderson-Brooks, Katrina
Baloch, Surriya
Hegarty, Kelsey
author_sort Tarzia, Laura
collection PubMed
description Sexual violence (SV) against women is common in higher education settings, causing serious harm to the health, well-being, and academic outcomes of victim/survivors. There have been numerous systematic reviews of the quantitative evidence on this topic, highlighting the prevalence, health impacts, and barriers and facilitators to help-seeking after SV. To date, however, qualitative research exploring the lived experience of women higher education students has not been synthesized. This scoping review and thematic synthesis of qualitative studies aims to map the global evidence on women higher education students’ experiences of SV and explore how they understand and make sense of their experiences. We searched five databases (CinAHL, Academic Search Complete, Medline, PsychInfo, and SocIndex) in January 2023 for relevant articles. Eligible articles needed to be published in English and describe qualitative or mixed-methods primary research on the lived experiences of women higher education students who were victim/survivors of SV. In all, 34 articles describing 32 studies met these inclusion criteria. Thematic analysis of data extracted from the included studies suggests that, for women higher education students, the experience of SV is characterized by profound shame, with often-irreversible impacts on hopes and plans for the future. Yet, at the same time, SV is normalized and expected as a part of the “student experience.” Furthermore, an imagined “specter” of “real violence” is held up as a constant comparison that serves to minimize and trivialize their experiences. These findings have important implications for higher education providers seeking to improve programs to address SV.
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spelling pubmed-106664682023-11-23 Women Higher Education Students’ Experiences of Sexual Violence: A Scoping Review and Thematic Synthesis of Qualitative Studies Tarzia, Laura Henderson-Brooks, Katrina Baloch, Surriya Hegarty, Kelsey Trauma Violence Abuse Review Manuscripts Sexual violence (SV) against women is common in higher education settings, causing serious harm to the health, well-being, and academic outcomes of victim/survivors. There have been numerous systematic reviews of the quantitative evidence on this topic, highlighting the prevalence, health impacts, and barriers and facilitators to help-seeking after SV. To date, however, qualitative research exploring the lived experience of women higher education students has not been synthesized. This scoping review and thematic synthesis of qualitative studies aims to map the global evidence on women higher education students’ experiences of SV and explore how they understand and make sense of their experiences. We searched five databases (CinAHL, Academic Search Complete, Medline, PsychInfo, and SocIndex) in January 2023 for relevant articles. Eligible articles needed to be published in English and describe qualitative or mixed-methods primary research on the lived experiences of women higher education students who were victim/survivors of SV. In all, 34 articles describing 32 studies met these inclusion criteria. Thematic analysis of data extracted from the included studies suggests that, for women higher education students, the experience of SV is characterized by profound shame, with often-irreversible impacts on hopes and plans for the future. Yet, at the same time, SV is normalized and expected as a part of the “student experience.” Furthermore, an imagined “specter” of “real violence” is held up as a constant comparison that serves to minimize and trivialize their experiences. These findings have important implications for higher education providers seeking to improve programs to address SV. SAGE Publications 2023-04-10 2024-01 /pmc/articles/PMC10666468/ /pubmed/37036144 http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/15248380231162976 Text en © The Author(s) 2023 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access page (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).
spellingShingle Review Manuscripts
Tarzia, Laura
Henderson-Brooks, Katrina
Baloch, Surriya
Hegarty, Kelsey
Women Higher Education Students’ Experiences of Sexual Violence: A Scoping Review and Thematic Synthesis of Qualitative Studies
title Women Higher Education Students’ Experiences of Sexual Violence: A Scoping Review and Thematic Synthesis of Qualitative Studies
title_full Women Higher Education Students’ Experiences of Sexual Violence: A Scoping Review and Thematic Synthesis of Qualitative Studies
title_fullStr Women Higher Education Students’ Experiences of Sexual Violence: A Scoping Review and Thematic Synthesis of Qualitative Studies
title_full_unstemmed Women Higher Education Students’ Experiences of Sexual Violence: A Scoping Review and Thematic Synthesis of Qualitative Studies
title_short Women Higher Education Students’ Experiences of Sexual Violence: A Scoping Review and Thematic Synthesis of Qualitative Studies
title_sort women higher education students’ experiences of sexual violence: a scoping review and thematic synthesis of qualitative studies
topic Review Manuscripts
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10666468/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37036144
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/15248380231162976
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