College Students' Perceptions of Sex Work and Sex Trafficking

Presenter Information

Gretah Kangas, Minnesota State University, Mankato
Sedona Kintz, Minnesota State University, Mankato

Location

CSU Ballroom

Start Date

10-4-2018 2:00 PM

End Date

10-4-2018 3:30 PM

Student's Major

Psychology

Student's College

Social and Behavioral Sciences

Mentor's Name

Eric Sprankle

Mentor's Department

Psychology

Mentor's College

Social and Behavioral Sciences

Second Mentor's Name

Alexander Twohy

Second Mentor's Department

Psychology

Second Mentor's College

Social and Behavioral Sciences

Third Mentor's Name

Machensey Shalgren

Third Mentor's Deparment

Psychology

Third Mentor's College

Social and Behavioral Sciences

Description

The media, public policy, law enforcement, and anti-trafficking campaigns often conflate sex work and sex trafficking, which have negative consequences for both sex workers and those trafficked, and may leave the public misinformed. To assess the degree of confusion over this conflation, this study examined students' attitudes and knowledge on various elements of sex work and sex trafficking. Using an online convenience sample of 160 undergraduate students, 75.6% of participants agreed there is a difference between sex work and sex trafficking, yet results showed they were drastically misinformed about the differences. When presented with a series of news articles and vignettes containing sex work scenarios, the majority of participants believed non-trafficking instances to be cases of sex trafficking. Furthermore, 86.9% agreed that sex trafficking is a highly organized crime, and 89.4% agreed that sex trafficking is a threat to the US. In reality, however, there is no evidence that sex trafficking is a highly organized crime, and viewing sex trafficking as a national threat has provided support to the police to conduct broad-sweeping enforcement tactics that do little to curb sex trafficking, but largely negatively impacts marginalized sex workers (e.g., immigrants, women of color) through arrest and deportation (Meshkovska, Siegel, Stutterheim, & Bos, 2015). Overall, it is recommended the legal definitions of sex work and sex trafficking be assessed and revised to reduce conflation, and changes be made in the way sex work and sex trafficking are depicted and described in the media, public policy, law enforcement, and anti-trafficking campaigns.