Generally, I am expecting responses about 2 page in length, but clarity and insight are more valued than verbosity. Finally, what you submit must be your own work. It may be based on published and on-line references (these should be cited), but cut-and-paste jobs are plagiarism and thus cheating.
1) Alfred Kinsey is widely regarded as a pioneer in the area of scientific investigation of human sexual behavior. Imagine that you are researcher interested in updating Kinsey's survey of sexual behaviors for the 21st century. How would you select and recruit a representative sample of adults for the survey? How large of a sample would you need to have in order to insure statistical significance? Would your survey be limited, like Kinsey's, to the USA? What interview techniques would your team employ? What areas of human sexual behavior, perhaps including some overlooked by Kinsey, would you cover in the survey?
2) Discuss the myths, stereotypes, and misconceptions concerning HIV/AIDS that were common during the start of the AIDS epidemic in the early 1980's. How have public perceptions and knowledge concerning HIV/AIDS changed from that time to the present?
3) Complete the work sheet, "Is this harassment", posted in the course documents section of the course Blackboard site.
4) Detail what actions or interventions you would take as a parent, if your child were intersexed - that is, having genital characteristics of both male and female. Do you agree or disagree with recommendations that you access on internet intersex support sites? Would you intervene in early childhood, at puberty, or not at all?
- For each scenario below, decide whether sexual harassment occurred, whether it was mild, moderate, or severe, what the "perpetrator" could or should have done differently, and what the "victim" could do about the problem or potential problem.
1. Your college instructor is warm, friendly, and one of those people who like to touch others in a compassionate manner. Her students like her, she touches many of them on the shoulder when she works with them, and she hugs past students who come back to visit her. After twenty years, she is shocked when the Dean calls her into his office because a former student has complained that her friendly touches created a hostile work environment for her, which explains the poor grade this student got in the class.
2. A female student has asked a male student to stop asking her out on dates and to stop paying her compliments. He continues to sit next to her (she hasn't moved her seat) and he stares at her throughout most of each class, but he has stopped talking to her.
3. A teacher notices that one of his students has a crush on him. Both are adults, and when they talk after class she has made it clear that she would like to date him. He tells her that they could get together to work on her academic standing, which has been slipping recently. During a tutoring session, his attraction to her gets the better of him and he talks her into having sex with him, saying it won't hurt her grade. She gets a "C" for the course.
4. A construction worker whistles and applauds as an attractive woman walks by his construction site every day. The woman always quickens her pace to get past the building as fast as possible, but every once in a while she smiles a little, suggesting that she enjoys being found attractive. The worker's buddy pokes him and says he could be putting the company at risk for a sexual harassment lawsuit, but the worker doesn't think that's likely to happen and continues to whistle and applaud at attractive women.