New Justice Department Study Reveals That About 1 in 52 College Women Have Been Victims of Rape/sexual Assault

Trigger Warning: If you are upset by facts about campus sexual assault please stop reading now.

The Department of Justice (Bureau of Justice Statistics) released a report yesterday titled “Rape and Sexual Assault Victimization Among College-Age Females, 1995–2013.”  The report was based on the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) of women ages 18-24 for both reported and unreported cases of rape and sexual assault. Rape and sexual assault are defined by the NCVS to include: a) completed and attempted rape, b) completed and attempted sexual assault, and c) threats of rape or sexual assault, so the study provides a pretty comprehensive analysis of rape and sexual assault among young women. The report includes both: a) students (enrolled in college, university, trade school, or vocational school) and b) nonstudents for the 18 to 24 age group, which allows for a comparison of “campus rape/sexual assault” and offenses that take place for that age group among nonstudents. Here are some of the report’s findings:

1. Over the 1995-2013 period, the rate of rape and sexual assault victimization was almost 25% higher for nonstudents ages 18-24 (7.6 cases per 1,000 females) compared to students enrolled in a post-secondary institution in that age group (6.1 cases per 1,000 females), see chart above. So despite all of the media attention on campus sexual assault, women enrolled in colleges and universities are actually much safer compared to women in that age group who are not attending a post-secondary institution.

2. Over the 1995-2013 period, the rate of rape and sexual assault victimization for both students and nonstudents has been falling (see chart).  For women attending college, the rate of rape/sexual assault has fallen by more than 50%, from 9.2 incidents per 1,000 women in 1997 to 4.4 cases per 1,000 in 2013. According to the media, politicians and gender activists, there is supposed to be a college “rape epidemic” when in fact, the rate of college female victimization has been trending downward for the last two decades.

3. What might be the most important statistic (and was not provided in the report and is not being reported by the media, except Ashe Schow at the Washington Examiner) is that the data provided by the NCVS show that only about 1 in 41 women were victims of rape or sexual assault (threatened, completed and attempted; and reported and unreported) while in college for four years during the entire period investigated from 1995 to 2013, based on this analysis:

6.1 women per 1,000 = “1 in 163.9 women” per year, and over four years attending college would then be = “1 in 41 women” while in college. 

Because the victimization rate has been trending downward, that same analysis using data from the last four years (2010 to 2013) reveals that 1 in 52.6 women have been sexually assaulted or raped in recent years.

Bottom Line: Using Bureau of Justice survey data that includes: a) reported and unreported cases of sexual assault and rape, and b) threatened, attempted and completed cases, the rate of campus sexual assault, we can say that:

1. Women ages 18 to 24 attending college have about a 25% lower chance of being the victim of rape or sexual assault compared to their nonstudent counterparts.

2. College campuses have become safer for women in the last few decades, based on the decline in the rape/assault rate by 50% since 1997.

3. Over the last four years, about 1 in 52 college women were raped or sexually assaulted, which is different by a factor of more than ten times compared to the “1 in 5” claim made by the White House based on the findings of one survey from students at two universities. Of course, 1 in 52 college women being the victim of a rape or sexual assault is still too high, but the controversy about campus sexual assault (and the victims) is best served by truthful and accurate data, and this new report from the Justice Department will hopefully contribute to the accuracy of the data on a very important issue.