Peer sexual harassment in adolescence: Dimensions of the sexual harassment survey in boys and girls

The phenomenon of adolescent sexual harassment is a topic that has taken on special relevance in recent decades. However, general consensus regarding its nature, prevalence and dimensions has yet to emerge. This study used a representative sample of 3,489 Andalusian adolescents from the second stage of Compulsory Secondary Education (E.S.O.) and the Spanish Baccalaureate (Bachillerato), and it is primarily focused on two main objectives: to test the factor structure of the “sexual harassment” scale in boys and girls, and to analyze the prevalence of hte sexual harassment among adolescent students. Descriptive analyses and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) were performed, allowing us to explore the nature of the phenomenon and to describe its prevalence. The results obtained revealed a two-dimensional structure of this scale in both boys and girls: one dimension reflecting visual-verbal forms of sexual harassment and the second dimension including physical forms. Regarding to prevalence, the outcomes shown a high prevalence of sexual harassment involvement across both sexes during adolescence. However, boys were more involved in victimization and aggression than girls. The importance of analyzing the phenomenon in greater depth is also highlighted.