RU Professors Talk Hazing on With Good Reason Radio

The With Good Reason radio program is re-airing on March 1-7 an interview with Radford University's Tod Burke and Stephen Owen in which they discuss their study "Hazing in Student Organizations: Prevalence, Attitudes and Solutions."

Listeners in the New River Valley can hear Burke and Owen on With Good Reason at 6 p.m., Tuesday, March 4 on Public Radio WVRU 89.9. Programs also are available through podcasts at withgoodreasonradio.org.

Published in Oracle: The Research Journal of the Association of Fraternity Advisors, the study explores student attitudes toward hazing and the prevalence of the ritual, particularly in groups outside of fraternity and sororities.

Burke, the associate dean of RU's College of Humanities and Behavioral Sciences and professor of criminal justice, and Owen, a professor and chair of the university's Department of Criminal Justice, found through a sampling of college students that hazing is not limited to fraternities and sororities, but that the act occurs in numerous student organizations.

In addition, the study developed a method for classifying, understanding and defining hazing.

With Good Reason has won twice the Gabriel Award for Best Documentary/Public Affairs Program and is also the recipient of top honors from the Virginia Association of Broadcasters and a second place in the Public Radio News Directors' competition.

With Good Reason is produced by the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities for the Virginia Higher Education Broadcasting Consortium and is broadcast in Washington, D.C.; Virginia; Maryland; Tennessee; Georgia; Alaska; California; and Michigan.