Evaluation of Virtual Course to Increase Knowledge in Sexual Harassment,Prevention and Sanction Policies of a University

Overview

Sexual harassment is the behavior of sexual or sexist connotation unwanted by the affected person. Despite being considered as gender-based violence, victims of sexual harassment can be of both sexes. The university is the most frequent place where university students suffer sexual harassment. Law No. 27942 - "Ley de Prevención y Sanción del Hostigamiento Sexual" and its amendments, includes training and prevention in sexual harassment. The Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia (UPCH) has a regulation for the prevention and punishment of sexual harassment. Education through the use of Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) is presented as an alternative to face-to-face classes, optimizing resources and achieving greater scope. The early, mandatory and massive dissemination at the university of a training in sexual harassment could be achieved through a virtual course. However, there is little research on the evaluation of the effectiveness of prevention programs in sexual violence in university students. The objective is to prove that taking a virtual course about sexual harassment, prevention and sanction policies of the UPCH can achieve a greater or same knowledge of the subject in the students of the UPCH, compared to a face-to-face course. The study design is a randomized controlled trial to assess the level of knowledge in this subject, whose control group is provided classes in face-to-face mode. Also, both modalities of the course will include a survey with Likert scale to measure the degree of satisfaction with the course taken. And finally, it includes a qualitative study through focus groups with the university students of the classroom and virtual classes to know their appreciations of both modalities of the course.

Main Objective: Compare the improvement of knowledge about sexual harassment, prevention and sanction policies of the UPCH of the asynchronous virtual course with the face-to-face course in students of the UPCH. Study Design: A randomized control trial will compare the improvement of knowledge among who received asynchronous virtual classes and those who received face-to-face classes by applying a pre-test and 2 post-test. The pre-test and the first post-test will be taken the day of the intervention and the second post-test will be taken after a month to measure knowledge retention. To measure the degree of satisfaction with the course modality, the intervention's day the students will take a survey with Likert scale. And separately, some students of the intervention and control group will be interview in focus groups to know their appreciations about the satisfaction perceived with the modality of the course taken. Population: Undergraduate university students enrolled in the 2019-II period of the Faculty of Public Health and Administration (FASPA). Sample: For the randomized control trial, a sample of 67 participants per group was calculated with a significance of 95%, a power of 80% and a loss of follow-up rate of 6%, to show a difference of 7% in the scores of knowledge of sexual harassment between the two groups. For the qualitative analysis of the focus groups, for each course modality, there will be two sessions of 6 people who completed the course. However, focus groups will continue to be carried out until the sample becomes saturated, that is, until the information obtained from these meetings is redundant or the objectives of the study are clarified. Group assignment: Students of FASPA will be invited to participate by flyers and invitations in classrooms. Also, by e-mail they will receive an invitation with the informational consent form and a link to fill out a registration form for the ones who are interested in participating. If inclusion and exclusion criteria are met, students will be accepted to participate in the study and they will be randomly assigned to one of the two groups. Finally they will receive an e-mail confirming their participation and the available schedules for the classes. Ethical considerations: Students who are registered and want to participate but do not meet the inclusion and exclusion criteria of the study, will be offered the virtual course restricting the access to the evaluations. Every participant will receive the informational consent form. Data confidentiality will be maintained. Personal identifiers will be stored in a separate database, which will be password protected and accessible only to the research team. At the end of this project, UPCH will be able to dispose of the virtual course developed in this study for the purposes that may be appropriate.