Electronic sexual harassment of women Field study on a sample of female university students

The main objective of the study was to evaluate the exposure of female students to the electronic sexual harassment, and its correlation with the sociodemographic variables, and to find the relation between the e-harassment and the use of social-media platforms, the nature of communication, the identity of the user, and the built of a virtual relationship. In addition, to evaluate the consequences of said harassment on female students, and the measures needed to be taken following the e-harassment using an analytical descriptive method, an online questionnaire was made as a tool to this study consisting of 22 questions, 17 of which are the “scale of the electronic harassment”, the validity and the reliability was measured. There was a contrast between the verbal, visual and especially forced e-harassment, a correlation was found between the extent of use of social-media platforms and the methods of communication. Among the consequences of e-harassment on female students’ personalities: social isolation, fear of receiving texts or social-media notifications, fear of using internet and social-media, anxiety and stress. All victims have blocked the harasser’s accounts following the e-harassment, while only 4% made a complaint and prosecuted them. Some measures are to be taken in case of e-harassment; controlling virtual relationships, securing personal laptops and accounts and security measures’ education. The main reasons for e-harassment is the falling of social values, sexual delinquencies; pornography, online prostitution, digital facies, emotional deprivation