1 in 4 Undergrads Sexually Assaulted, Study Finds

Nearly a quarter of female undergraduate students have experienced sexual assault but most don’t report it to authorities, according to one of the largest studies ever conducted on the issue of campus rape.

The findings show a greater prevalence of sexual assault than prior studies, but the sheer size of this week’s study by the Association of American Universities lends credence to calls for American universities to prioritize the problem. Analysts surveyed more than 150,000 students at 27 universities from the University of Southern California to Columbia.

Some of the more troubling findings reflect what University of Southern California Vice President for Student Affairs Ainsley Carry regularly sees during the course of his work handling sexual assault allegations on campus.

According to the study, more than half of the women who said they were forcibly raped did not report it because they didn’t think it was “serious enough.” About 10 percent of female undergraduates reported having been forcibly raped. About 23 percent said they experienced unwanted sexual contact from kissing and groping to penetration.

And when it comes to drug or alcohol related sexual assault, nearly half of the respondents admitted seeing “a drunk person heading for a sexual encounter,” but most admitted they did not intervene.

“In almost every case I have reviewed at the appeal level, there are witnesses, other students who were there and said ‘I didn’t know what to do. In hindsight, I wish I had done something,’”said Carry. “They don’t feel a duty to assist, and I take that as they don’t know how to intervene. It takes some courage and a skillset to do it.”

Bystander education has become a major component of USC’s efforts to combat sexual assault, he said.

Last year, USC, the University of California Berkeley, Occidental College and the Butte-Glen Community College District were the four California institutions among 55 placed under federal investigation for handling of sexual assault allegations.

In response to the investigation, the school revamped its process for handling sexual assault cases.

“We have a lot of work to do,” said Carry. “We are not happy with where we are right now. We think we can do better.”

USC officials spent more than a year interviewing students, greek councils, consultants, and national experts trying to analyze its shortcomings. They sought to understand where and how the assaults tend to occur, why victims may hesitate to come forward, and why witnesses so frequently fail to intervene.

They realized they need to change their process for handling sexual assault allegations starting with how they communicate with students, said Carry. The school needed to clarify its process and list of resources in a single accessible site, so students could know what to expect when they are thinking about reporting an assault.

They made confidential counselors available so students could talk about the assault without worrying that it would be reported to authorities before making the decision to report it themselves. And they needed to make it clear that victims and witnesses would have amnesty if they reported an assault that involved underaged drinking or drug use, Carry said.

The school has instituted these changes, but that’s the easy part.

The real challenge, the way to bring the rate of campus sex assaults down to zero, is to change the culture, said Carry.

In addition to thinking the assault wasn’t serious, a  significant percentage of students say they did not report because they were “…embarrassed, ashamed or that it would be too emotionally difficult” or “...did not think anything would be done about it,” the survey found.

USC has instituted a mandatory online course for students to take prior to their first semester. It explains consent, sexual misconduct, alcohol consumption as a contributing risk factor, and how alcohol impairs judgement, said Carry.

Combined with a focus on bystander education, the goal is to change the culture, he said.

Carry compares it to the evolution of drunk driving which went from common to taboo with bystanders feeling a responsibility to intervene. Today, people will take keys away from an obviously drunk driver, he said.

“We need to move the conversation of sexual assault into a place of shared responsibility. We have got to get to the place where the culture sees this as inappropriate, offensive and will not condone it,” Carry added. “I need help from our students. When they see something getting ready to happen, intervene.”