NCJ Number
198408
Journal
Violence and Victims Volume: 17 Issue: 5 Dated: October 2002 Pages: 511-524
Date Published
October 2002
Length
14 pages
Annotation
This article presents a national estimate of the prevalence of wife rape and various other types of sexual coercion by a spouse or intimate partner.
Abstract
Data were collected as part of a 1997 national poll that involved a random telephone survey of 1,108 residents in the continental United States. Respondents were interviewed in spring 1997 on a variety of public policy issues in addition to the prevalence of intimate sexual coercion. All adult residents (18 years old or older) of the United States with a working telephone were eligible participants. The sample was stratified by county proportionate to the estimated number of households in each county. The survey asked women if they had ever had sex with a husband or partner when they did not want to (yes or no). Those women who answered "yes" to this question were presented with seven different circumstances under which they might have been forced to have sex with an intimate partner or husband against their will. The measures used in this survey differed from most previous studies in this area by examining an extensive continuum of sexual coercion, starting with more subtle forms of coercion and extending to the threat of physical harm and the actual use of physical force. The survey found that 34 percent of the women respondents were victims of some type of sexual coercion with a husband or partner in their lifetime. Of these women, 10 percent experienced rape by a current partner. This rate increased to 13 percent when only victims of rape by a current husband were included; this is consistent with previous studies of wife rape. Other findings show that women had unwanted sex with a current spouse or partner in return for a partner's spending money on them (24 percent), because they believed it was their "duty" (43 percent), after a romantic situation (29 percent), after the partner begged and pleaded with them (26 percent), and after their partner said things to bully them (9 percent). The author notes that the subtle processes that result in women having unwanted sex may be connected to more severe experiences, in that mildly coercive relationships could become more dangerous and severely coercive with time. 3 tables and 46 references