Personal Safety and Fear of Sexual Harassment among Female Garment Workers in Bangladesh

Muhammad Akram Uzzaman, Zamadonda Nokuthula Xulu-Kasaba and Muhammad Ehsanul Haque
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Muhammad Akram Uzzaman: Department of Psychology, Jagannath University, Dhaka 1100, Bangladesh
Zamadonda Nokuthula Xulu-Kasaba: Discipline of Optometry, School of Health Sciences, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban 4001, South Africa
Muhammad Ehsanul Haque: Graduate School of Business, MANCOSA, Durban 4001, South Africa

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 24, 1-11

Abstract: Personal safety and fear of sexual harassment may discourage women from participating at work and in public life, limiting their life opportunities. The study proposed to determine personal safety and fear of sexual harassment among female garment workers in Bangladesh. This cross-sectional study was conducted among 201 female garment workers from Dhaka and Chittagong cities. Participants were selected using snowballing sampling techniques with the data collected by using anonymised questionnaires. The Pearson product–moment correlation and analysis of variance were employed using SPSS version 27.0. Results showed that 25% of the participants perceived that they were most likely to be sexually harassed by their manager and 25% never felt safe going to work. Age and the marital status of the participants were significantly associated with personal safety and fear of sexual harassment ( p < 0.05). The correlation analysis found a significant positive correlation between personal safety and the fear of sexual harassment [r (201) = 0.85 **, p < 0.05], among the participants. A deep commitment from leadership with cooperation at all levels of the organisations is required to address these acts of violence and organisational conditions, rather than a form of unreflective compliance or a ‘gender-neutral’ approach that fails to recognise individual needs and maintain gender inequality.

Keywords: sexual crime; personal safety; female garment workers (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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