College administrators, students differ on what hazing is

A new study has uncovered a wide divide between what college students consider to be hazing and what university officials and researchers do.

In the study surveying about 700 undergraduates at Cornell University, an Ivy League school, just 6.7 percent reported they had been a hazer, while almost twice as many -- 12.4 percent -- reported they had been hazed.

However, when presented with a list of team-building activities commonly used by Greek houses or athletic teams, 36 percent of the students indicated they had engaged in one or more of the initiation activities that met the study definition of hazing, such as drinking games, sleep deprivation or acting as a personal servant to others.

“I would say it is absolutely a health issue,” says researcher Shelly Campo, an assistant professor at the University of Iowa, the lead author of the study. “Hazing leads to a significant number of injuries – psychologically and physically.”

The study appears in the March-April issue of the American Journal of Health Behavior. Campo’s research colleague was Gretchen Poulos, a former health promotion assistant at Cornell.

Hazing was found to be “a fairly common activity associated with a broad range of organizations,” and prevention focused only on the Greek-letter organizations leaves the rest of the campus vulnerable, Campo says.

The study also revealed that, despite the seeming contradiction, students who had engaged in hazing activities were also the most likely to have experienced positive team-building activities like ropes courses, community service or recreational sports.

That finding suggests that student organizations are heeding the message to include positive bonding rituals in their initiations. But instead of replacing abusive activities, Campo said, the students seem to have simply constructive team-building activities as a supplement to hazing.

Colleges can help students avoid hazing by encouraging young people to diversify their network of friends, Campo says, because the surveyed students ranked as the strongest factor enabling them to walk away from a hazing situation is “having friends outside of the organization to support me.”

“People felt like they needed social support to get out of a hazing situation, and if all of your friends are in the group, it’s going to be harder,” she says.

Students who spend intense hours of official and unofficial time together, like varsity athletes, have fewer opportunities to encounter other people or experience the range of activities a school can offer, she said.

Campo advocates prevention campaigns aimed at freshmen, who are just beginning to form social ties. And, she says, colleges should set policies that discourage pledge activities that start early in the freshman year or before the school year begins.

Findings from the survey helped Cornell design a series of anti-hazing initiatives including a new hazing-education Web site scheduled to launch in March, according to Timothy Marchell, the university’s director of alcohol policy initiatives.

The Web site, sponsored by Cornell’s Office of Dean of Students, will list university-defined hazing activities and allow students to report hazing incidents anonymously.

Cornell’s fraternity and sorority leaders are involved in the site development, Marchell said. The school’s Greek council will extend its “sunshine policy” by posting hazing violations on the new anti-hazing Web site, he added.

“We are trying to help people understand what constitutes hazing, what to do if you are being hazed, what to do if a friend is being hazed,” Marchell said.