Throughout our website and learning materials, you’ll find statistics on sexual violence. Some common ones we refer to include:

We use stats because these broad averages can help us to understand and illustrate just how many people are impacted by sexual violence, as well as the dynamics where sexual violence occurs. It’s important to note, however, that statistics – and particularly those referring to prevalence rates of sexual violence – have the potential to be harmful if they’re not read with a critical eye and used with care and proper context. As an example, statistics that demonstrate the experiences of one demographic of people may intentionally or unintentionally erase the experiences of another. Statistics can also have the damaging and dehumanizing effect of reducing complex people and experiences down to a number or percentage.

In this article, you’ll learn how to read sexual violence statistics in an informed and critical way that promotes an accurate understanding of the issue without creating more harm to those communities most impacted.

Getting sexual violence statistics can be a challenge

When reading statistics, it’s important to check the date of publication. The more recent the study, the better! Unfortunately, this presents a challenge when it comes to gathering data around sexual violence.

The reality is that studies that focus specifically on sexual violence – and particularly ones that demonstrate the experiences of marginalized communities – are both uncommon and underfunded.

While dedicated sexual violence statistics are rare, it is much more common for sexual violence statistics to be lumped into other categories such as violent crime and domestic violence. In some ways this grouping makes sense and is an accurate portrayal of the ways in which various forms of violence intersect. However, because violent crime and domestic violence are broad categories that include many forms of violence that are not sexual in nature, the data generated from these studies becomes difficult to interpret from a sexual violence perspective.

A note about American studies

The lack of funding for Canadian studies means that we often need to use American studies to give an accurate and inclusive picture of how sexual violence impacts different communities. One of the biggest challenges with using these statistics is that American studies of sexual violence often use different terminology. Specifically, American studies tend to separate rape or unwanted vaginal or anal penetration from other forms of sexual assault (groping, unwanted oral contact, unwanted oral-genital contact) while Canadian studies do not. Since the studies are not talking about the exact same thing, it becomes difficult to conduct direct comparisons or transfer American results to a Canadian context. This is an important point to keep in mind, even as we mention American statistics within this article.

Analyzing study methods

Another key question to ask yourself when reading statistics is how the information for those statistics was gathered. For instance, some sexual assault statistics rely on data generated from police reports. The issue is, for many valid reasons such as fears and past experiences of violence and harassment from law enforcement as well as fears of stigma from their communities, the vast majority (up to 95%) of people don’t report their experience of sexual assault to the police. In fact, sexual assault is one of the most under-reported crimes in Canada (Police-reported sexual assaults in Canada, 2009 to 2014: A statistical profile, 2017). This means that statistics taken from these studies are rarely representative of the broader population, and need to be read with some skepticism.

Other statistics rely on self-reporting or self-disclosure data generated from interviews and surveys. These methods have their advantages and can produce more representative data, but they also have limitations. Many sexual violence studies of this type are conducted over the phone. For some, being interviewed while they’re at home or in a familiar environment may help them feel safe to open up. For others, disclosing over the phone may not feel comfortable or they may not have the privacy to do so safely. In addition, these methods fail to capture incidents of sexual violence experienced by those who don’t have reliable access to a phone such as people who are experiencing homelessness and people who are incarcerated.

The accuracy and validity of phone surveys also depends on how the researchers phrase their questions. Let’s say someone who’s experienced a sexual assault is asked the question “have you ever been sexually assaulted?” They may reply “no” because they don’t identify with that language or they haven’t labelled their experience in that way. On the other hand, if that same person is asked if they’ve ever been touched sexually without their consent, or if they’ve ever been forced to participate in a sexual act that they did not want to take part in, they may respond “yes,” as this language lines up with an experience that they’ve had.

Given the barriers that exist to getting people to disclose their experiences in research, we always present prevalence rates as being at least as high as the number found in the respective study. The general assumption is that if those barriers to disclosure didn’t exist then those rates like two in three women, one in three men, and 45% of Albertans would likely be even higher.

Who’s not included?

Something else you may have noticed about the sexual violence statistics, including the ones we’ve listed above, is that they’re not inclusive of all people or experiences. As an example, the Alberta prevalence stats we’ve provided reflect the number of men and women who have experienced a single incident of sexual assault or abuse. What these numbers fail to show us is the number of people who have experienced sexual assault multiple times throughout their life.

Another fault of many studies is that they’re designed around a female/male gender binary which erases incidents of sexual violence experienced by nonbinary people who don’t fit that mold.

These same studies also don’t specify whether their definition of men or women is inclusive of transgender individuals. This is a big problem, because we know that trans and nonbinary people experience disproportionate rates of sexual violence. One study cites that trans and nonbinary people in the United States are two to three times more likely to experience sexual assault than cisgender people (Transgender Rates of Violence, 2012). (Note: Here’s an example of an American stat we use because Canadian studies that are inclusive or focused on queer and trans experiences are a particular gap that deserves better representation in the body of sexual violence research).

Additional problems arise when sexual violence studies choose to focus exclusively on the gender of their participants rather than taking into account intersecting identities (learn more about how gender and sexuality intersect with sexual violence). Statistics generated from these studies erase the fact that certain demographics of people experience higher rates than the national averages. Studies show:

There are also groups of people who are frequently underrepresented or misrepresented in research data. For example, a majority of relevant studies have found that racialized women experience lower rates of sexual violence than white women. However, in many of these studies the sample of participants is overwhelmingly white with little representation from people of colour, making it difficult to generalize these studies’ findings for racialized communities. On top of this, we know that many women from racialized communities – especially Indigenous, Black and Latinx women – have a deep-seated mistrust of the justice system due to historical and continued experiences of racism and oppression by these institutions. These same women may not feel comfortable disclosing experiences of sexual violence to primarily white universities and community groups who conduct sexual violence studies. For these reasons, we can confidently assume that rates of sexual violence within racialized communities is higher than what current research suggests.

Additionally, research has found that racialized individuals who hold additional intersectional identities that experience marginalization also experience higher rates of sexual violence than their non-racialized peers. For example, the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey found that racialized trans people experienced even higher rates of sexual assault than their white counterparts.

The true motivations of sexual violence

The above statistics demonstrate that sexual violence does not affect all communities equally. While these stats are incredibly significant and useful for understanding where to distribute resources and support, we need to be careful how we read into them.

It’s important to remember that there is nothing inherently wrong about specific communities that make them more deserving of, or susceptible to sexual violence.

Our society actively normalizes disrespect towards marginalized groups through systems of racism, sexism, colonialism, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, etc. These attitudes and beliefs are adopted by people who use offending behaviours, in order to justify the harm they cause to individuals who experience marginalization.

Analyzing these statistics also requires an understanding that the motivations of sexual violence are rooted in power, control, and entitlement. Sexual violence is not about sexual gratification, but rather about asserting control and dominance over someone in a position of vulnerability. When we as a society push people into positions of vulnerability through oppression and discrimination, we create opportunities for people who choose to use offending behaviours to cause harm.

Remembering the people behind the stats

Sexual violence statistics serve an important purpose in that they can promote public awareness while helping to secure funding for direct support and prevention resources for those most in need. However, these same statistics can serve to disempower people by reducing them to a number or their experience of sexual violence.

We cannot gain a full understanding of the impact and nature of sexual violence from data and research alone.

We must also listen to and believe the firsthand accounts people who publicly come forward about their experiences or who disclose to us in private. It is only through these accounts that we learn of the humanity and resiliency of the people too often hidden behind those percentages. It is only through asking them what they need and responding accordingly that we can come to serve and honour our community members who have experienced sexual violence.