Study: 1 in 5 women have been raped

Nearly one in five women — 19.3 percent — have been raped, new statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show.

Twice as many women report experiencing some other form of sexual violence, including sexual coercion and other unwanted sexual contact.

The CDC defines sexual coercion as “nonphysically pressured unwanted penetration,” sexual contact as behavior including “kissing or fondling” and non-contact unwanted sexual experience as “being flashed or forced to view sexually explicit media.”
Separate data from the same CDC research shows that most rapes are committed by someone the victim already knew. Forty-five percent, for example, said their rapist was a current or former significant other. The CDC estimates that a woman’s lifetime risk of rape by a partner is 8.8 percent — about nine in every 100 women.

“Although progress has been made in efforts to prevent sexual violence, stalking, and intimate partner violence,” the CDC authors write, “these forms of violence continue to exact a substantial toll upon U.S. adults.”