New research led by Sarah Cohodes, associate professor of public policy at the University of Michigan, has connected incidents of faculty sexual misconduct with significant declines in students’ degree-completion rates within the faculty’s field of study.
In an examination of 499 faculty misconduct cases at 287 higher education institutions in the United States from 1983 to 2022, the authors found a 3.4 percent decline in degree completion from the perpetrator’s academic field for all students four years after the incident occurred. After 2015, the statistic increased to 7 percent, which the authors attribute to the rise of the #MeToo movement. Notably, faculty misconduct had no significant impact on institutions’ enrollment.
When students change their majors, they potentially increase the time and money spent on their education. Switching their field of study could also change their career and wage outcomes, as students who change majors generally move to more gender separated fields. For example, the study found that a faculty gender-based misconduct incident shifted male students towards economics majors, a male-dominated field, and women towards education majors, a female-dominated field.
“Gender wage gaps persist in the U.S. economy despite the gains for women over recent decades, and they are attributable, in part, to occupational and industry segregation,” the authors write. “This occupational segregation may be due to ‘preferences’ for hours of work or flexibility, as well as being shaped by gender norms. However, this paper gives credence to the idea that part of these preferences are shaped by the desire to avoid sexual harassment and hostility, adding to [prior research] that anticipated discrimination shapes economic choices and can have long-lasting impacts on students’ careers.”
An affiliate of the National Bureau of Economic Research, Dr. Cohodes joined the University of Michigan faculty in 2023, following eight years of service at Columbia University’s Teachers College. She holds a bachelor’s degree in economics from Swarthmore College, as well as a master’s degree in education policy and management and a Ph.D. in public policy from Harvard University.
The research paper was co-authored by Katherine B. Leu, a doctoral student in sociology at the University of Michigan.
Photo credit: Sarah Lin