Quarter of US female undergrads sexually assaulted, survey finds

One in four female undergraduate students at leading research universities across the United States have been subjected to nonconsensual sexual contact, according to the findings of a national survey that shine a spotlight on the prevalence of sexual violence on campuses.

The survey was published on Tuesday by the Association of American Universities, or AAU, and Westat, a research firm based in Rockville, Maryland. Questionnaires were sent to 181,752 students from 33 colleges and universities.

Overall, 13 percent of the respondents reported being victims of nonconsensual sexual contact, but the numbers varied significantly by gender and affiliation.

About 25.9 percent of female undergraduates reported nonconsensual sexual contact by force or inability to consent, which was three times higher than for female graduate and professional students.

Among male undergraduate students, 6.8 percent of respondents said they were victims of sexual assault, against a rate of 2.5 percent reported by male graduate or professional students.

Among so-called TGQN students — those who identified as transgender woman, transgender man, nonbinary/ genderqueer, gender questioning, or gender not listed — 22.8 percent of undergraduates and 14.5 percent of graduate and professional students reported this type of victimization.

“This is the largest college-based probability sample survey carried out on sexual assault and misconduct, and it is a testament to the commitment that America’s leading research universities have to fighting these problems and improving the campus climate around these issues,” AAU President Mary Sue Coleman said in a statement.

“The results ... reveal that, while students know more about university-sponsored resources for victims of sexual assault and misconduct, they still aren’t using these resources often enough.”

In the survey, 36.9 percent of undergraduate women reported that they understood the definition of sexual assault and sexual misconduct, up from 11.5 percent in a survey in 2015. For undergraduate men, the figure rose from 12.4 percent to 40.3 percent.

Although 65.6 percent of the students said it was “very” or “extremely likely” that school officials would take a report of a sexual assault seriously, only 45 percent of those who reported nonconsensual sexual contact believed that was the case.

The University of Southern California, or USC, which has been rocked by controversies related to alleged sexual assaults by a former campus gynecologist, reported that in the 2019 survey, 20.5 percent of undergraduate students have experienced at least one incident of nonconsensual sexual contact involving physical force, compared with 19.3 percent in 2015.

“We are sharing these results with the campus community to confirm that we are committed to addressing this issue head-on in our efforts to build a community that is safe and protects our well-being,” wrote Sarah Van Orman, chief health officer at USC, and Winston B. Crisp, vice-president of student affairs, in a letter to the school community on Tuesday.