On April 2, 2026, a conference on slut-shaming was held and organized by GRISE. The present content is based on the presentations delivered during this event and was written by Alexa Martin-Storey, professor and Canada Research Chair in stigma and psychosocial development, Éléonore Chavignon, PhD student in psychoeducation, and Y-Lane Noémie Zaine, master’s student in psychoeducation at Université de Sherbrooke.

A recent conference Le slut-shaming : mieux comprendre ce phénomène pour soutenir les personnes adolescentes held on April 2nd, 2026 at the Université de Sherbrooke (Longueuil campus, Quebec) brought together researchers, educators, and other professionals to address a sticky and persistent problem: Slut-shaming. This text revisits the key concepts addressed during the conference and aims to demystify this discrimination experienced primarily by women and girls.

First, what does it mean to be slut-shamed? This term has a long history, but researchers who had scoured the existing literature, and who had analyzed hours of interviews with adolescent girls and young women generally convened on a definition of slut shaming as a form of victimization motivated by the target’s real or perceived sexual or sexualized behavior which is perceived as being in excess of social norms. And, while slut-shaming can occur to people of any age, this problem becomes particularly acute during adolescence.

In terms of understanding what slut-shaming looks like, adolescent girls labelled experiences as slut-shaming when others made negative comments about the length of their skirts or the cut of their shirts, spread rumors about their sexual behavior online, or accused them of being “too” interested or “too” flirtatious with boys. Girls also described how schools could be involved in slut-shaming, particularly through dress codes. For example, girls described rules about the size of straps on tank tops as slut-shaming.

Understanding where norms around what kinds of behavior are considered “too sexual” or “too sexualized” come from can help us to understand who is likely to experience slut-shaming. The charmed circle perspective argues that individuals whose sexual or sexualized behavior is seen as threatening to outside norms experience higher levels of penalization. Bay Cheng (2015) presents a charmed circle perspective to understand slut-shaming more specifically. She explains how because girls receive messages about the importance of being attractive earlier and more intensely than boys, they are expected to navigate a narrow pathway during adolescence. On the one hand, they are told that they need to be perceived as sexually or romantically appealing to men and boys. On the ther hand, they are also criticized for seeming too invested in seeming sexually or romantically interesting. In this context, slut-shaming serves as both a threat and a punishment for crossing this fine line.

Part of the negative consequences of slut-shaming stems from the feeling that it is almost impossible to “get it right,” that is to stay on the narrow pathway of behaviors deemed “acceptable”. Interviews with adolescent girls found that they were less likely to report slut-shaming compared to other forms of victimization because they felt more responsible for being slut-shamed than for other forms of victimization, and because they feared being blamed for being slut-shamed because of their clothing or behavior.

In addition to girls more broadly, other groups were also identified as reporting higher levels of slut-shaming. Sexual minority youth (i.e., youth who reported sexual identities like gay, lesbian, bisexual, pansexual) and gender minority youth (i.e., youth who report gender identities different than their sex assigned at birth like transgender youth or non-binary youth) also reported higher levels of slut-shaming. Research has long suggested that these groups face higher levels of other forms of sexual violence like sexual harassment.

Students with disabilities also reported higher levels of slut-shaming, possibly reflecting how these students too are frequently desexualized by their peers. Any sexualized behaviour, then, from these students may lead to social approbation.

Finally, racialized girls report frequently experiencing slut-shaming. These findings likely reflect how certain groups of racialized girls, most notably Black girls, are perceived as more mature earlier in development, and experience higher levels of sexual harassment. In thinking about how slut-shaming is used to enforce norms around gender and sexuality, it makes sense that individuals with wide varieties of marginalized identities are more likely to report these experiences.

Concerns about unwanted sexual comments or behaviors is not new, and slut-shaming can be conceptualized as a sub-type of sexual harassment (i.e., unwanted conduct of a sexual nature) the has the purpose of violating a person’s dignity. Among adolescents, slut-shaming is associated with negative outcomes like distress and skipping schools for safety concerns even when accounting for general sexual harassment. Even more upsettingly, experimental studies have shown that young people perceived as more “sexualized” are more often blamed in cases of victimization than those who are not perceived as such.

Ultimately, research suggests that students do not feel like they are getting the support they need regarding slut-shaming. Although slut-shaming is related to other forms of victimization, slut-shaming may need to be addressed specifically in curricula around gender stereotypes and bullying. School systems may also need to be more explicit about addressing this form of harm. Existing resources in schools like sex education and anti-bullying programs for adolescents may be a crucial first place for raising awareness and equipping students to address these issues from a young age.

Bay-Cheng, L. Y. (2015). The agency line: A neoliberal metric for appraising young women’s sexuality. Sex Roles, 73(7), 279-291.

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Gramazio, S., Cadinu, M., Pagliaro, S., & Pacilli, M. G. (2021). Sexualization of sexual harassment victims reduces bystanders’ help: The mediating role of attribution of immorality and blame. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 36(13-14), 6073-6097.

Grower, P., Ward, L. M., & Rowley, S. (2021). Beyond objectification: Understanding the correlates and consequences of sexualization for black and white adolescent girls. Journal of Research on Adolescence, 31(2), 273-281.

Lavigne, R. M., Martin-Storey, A., Paquette, G., Boutin, S., Dirks, M., & Lemelin, J. P. (2025). Understanding adolescent girls’ perspectives on barriers and facilitators to help-seeking for slut-shaming. Journal of School Violence, 24(4), 571-585.

Martin‐Storey, A., Dirks, M., Paquette, G., Boutin, S., Dryburgh, N. S., Leduc, K., ... & Temcheff, C. (2023). The Slut‐Shaming Instrument: Preliminary validation, correlates, and links with psychological distress among adolescent girls. Journal of Research on Adolescence, 33(4), 1447-1457.

Martin-Storey, A., Dirks, M. A., Exner-Cortens, D., Holfeld, B., Lambe, L., & Craig, W. (2026). Understanding Slut-Shaming in the School Context: Evidence for a Novel Form of Bias-Based Peer Victimization. Journal of School Violence, 1-14.

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Pacilli, M. G., Pagliaro, S., Loughnan, S., Gramazio, S., Spaccatini, F., & Baldry, A. C. (2017). Sexualization reduces helping intentions towards female victims of intimate partner violence through mediation of moral patiency. British Journal of Social Psychology, 56(2), 293-313.

Ward, L. M., Jerald, M. C., Grower, P., Daniels, E. A., & Rowley, S. (2023). Primping, performing, and policing: Social media use and self-sexualization among US White, Black, and Asian-American adolescent girls. Body Image, 46, 324-335.