The Formative Value of the Discussion Group on Sexual and Gender Related Violence in Higher Education Institutions

This work is part of a broader research project whose objective was to construct, based on a feminist methodology, a questionnaire for the detection and visibility of sexual and gender related violence in the university through a collective process. Here we focus on the first phase of this process which are the discussion groups and specifically on their formative value. We conducted 11 discussion groups, 9 specific (with groups without representation in the literature on sexual and gender related violence) and 2 heterogeneous (with the entire university community: students, teaching and research staff, administration and services staff and subcontracted staff) with a total of 80 participants. We analysed and categorised the transcripts with Atlas.ti v7 software based on the literature review and previous questionnaires on sexual and gender related violence at the university, as well as the categories emerging from the discussion groups. The results went beyond what and how to ask about sexual and gender related violence, highlighting the formative value of the discussion groups and their characteristics. According to the literature, discussion groups promote critical reflection, situate participants as active subjects, and allow them to recognise the existence of a problem. However, our results show that discussion groups also generate networks of joint learning, mobilise collaborative action strategies, create a space for reconstruction and understanding, and stimulate well- being. We conclude by highlighting the formative value and pedagogical potential of discussion groups, which are often only considered as a data collection technique, and we frame the characteristics of this value in critical pedagogy and feminist epistemologies. DOI.10.3726/ b20999