Survey Finds That 23 Percent of Undergraduate Women Are Subjected to Unwanted Sexual Contact

A major new study on sexual assault on college campuses was recently published by the Association of American Universities. The report found that 23 percent of undergraduate women students said that they had been victims of sexual contact involving physical force or incapacitation since entering college. Nine percent of women graduate students said they had been victimized in this manner.

The report was the result of surveys taken at 27 prestigious colleges and universities across the United States. Although the report does not single out the results at particular schools, most of the universities have released the results at their campus. The results varied widely from campus to campus. At the California Institute of Technology, 13 percent of the undergraduate women said they were victims of sexual assault. At the University of Michigan and the University of Southern California, 30 percent of women reported they had been victims of sexual contact involving physical force or incapacitation since entering college.

The results found that large percentages of these sexual assaults involved drugs or alcohol. And the survey also found that very few of these incidents were reported to campus authorities or police.

The Association of American Universities stated that 36 percent of the students at these universities responded to the survey. Questions will remain about whether the results are representative of the campuses as a whole or whether victims of sexual assault are more likely, or less likely, than students generally to respond. The report said there were some indications that “non-victims may have been less likely to participate” in the surveys. But the bottom line is that huge numbers of women on these campuses reported that they had been victimized.

The Report on the AAU Campus Climate Survey on Sexual Assault and Sexual Misconduct may be downloaded by clicking here.