Acquaintance Rape of College Students

Acquaintance Rape of College Students:

“Women ages 16 to 24 experience rape at rates four times higher than the assault rate of all women (Humphrey and Kahn - 2000),” making the college (and high school) years the most vulnerable for women. College women are more at risk for rape and other forms of sexual assault than women the same age but not in college.  It is estimated that almost 25 percent of college women have been victims of rape or attempted rape since the age of 14.

Rape rates vary to some extent by school, type of school and region, suggesting that certain schools and certain places within schools are more rape-prone than others. Some features of the college environment - frequent unsupervised parties, easy access to alcohol, single students living on their own, and the availability of private rooms - may contribute to high rape rates of women college students.

College women are raped at significantly higher rates than college men. College men are more likely to report experiencing unwanted kissing or fondling than intercourse.  College men who are raped are usually raped by other men. However, since so few men report, information is limited about the extent of the problem.  Even current national data collection systems fail to capture information about rape of men; the FBI’s Uniform Crime Report (UCR) does not provide data on male rape victims. Researchers have begun to fill this information gap with survey data, which suggest that up to 10 percent of acquaintance rape victims on campus are men.

Reprinted from “Acquaintance Rape of College Students” (9/21/11)

The U.S. Department of Justice website: http://www.cops.usdoj.gov/ric/ResourceDetail.aspx?RID=6