Australian Institute of Criminology study finds one in five have perpetrated sexual violence in Australia
A new study has shed light on just how prevalent sexual violence is in the Australian community — with one in five people admitting to having carried out one or more forms of sexual violence since turning 18.
The new Australian Institute of Criminology study questioned 5076 Australian men and women aged between 18 and 45.
The study was conducted between May and June last year with the help of Roy Morgan Research.
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By continuing you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy.Those who took part in the study were presented with a range of yes or no type questions, which included: “Have you ever kissed someone when they didn’t want you to?”; and “have you ever touched, groped, fondled, grabbed, pinched, or rubbed against someone else when they did not want you to?”
A key finding from the study found more than 22 per cent of the 5000 plus respondents perpetrated at least one form of sexual violence during adulthood, and about 9.9 per cent had done so in the past 12 months.
The study found the most common forms of sexual violence perpetrated in the previous 12 months were:
- Pressuring someone for dates or sexual activity (3.8 per cent);
- Emotionally or psychologically manipulating someone to participate in sexual activity (2.7 per cent)
- Non-consensual kissing (2.6 per cent);
- Non-consensual touching (2.4 per cent); and
- Pressuring someone to participate in unprotected sexual activity (2.4 per cent).
More than 11 per cent of those who took part in the study said they had perpetrated a sexual assault during adulthood, and about five per cent said they had done so in the past 12 months.
The most common forms of sexual assault perpetrated were non-consensual kissing and non-consensual touching.
AIC deputy director Rick Brown said the findings from the study would help provide a more accurate estimate of the rate of sexual violence perpetration in Australia.
“The estimates in this study are drawn on self-reported data and may overcome many of the issues inherent in official data held by police and criminal justice agencies, which have been relied upon to gauge the prevalence of sexual violence perpetration in Australia,” Dr Brown said.
“Perpetrators who have contact with the criminal justice system represent only a small proportion of those who have perpetrated sexual violence. The vast majority of offences and perpetrators are never reported to police, and attrition rates are high among cases of sexual violence that do come to the attention of police, meaning few actually progress to prosecution and conviction.”
Men were more likely than women to commit all forms of sexual violence, the AIC study also found.
The report noted the biggest differences in perpetration rates between men and women related to more “assaultive forms of sexual violence.”
“Additionally, men were significantly more likely than women to have perpetrated more than one form of sexual violence,” the report concluded.
“As such, the results suggest not only that men were more likely to perpetrate sexual violence than women, but also that they perpetrated more serious forms of violence when they did, and possibly more frequently.”
