Survey Shows MSU, U-M Co-eds Reluctant to Report Sexual Assaults

More than 70 percent of campus females at both the University of Michigan and Michigan State University who said they had been the victim of some sort of sexual assault, but didn’t report it, according to a new survey. (Photo via Shutterstock)

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More than 70 percent of females at the University of Michigan and Michigan State University, both facing scrutiny by the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights for their handling of sexual assault reports, who said they had been sexually assaulted didn’t report their rapes, according to a new study.

At Michigan State, which earlier this month agreed to a settlement with the OCR, 71.9 percent of females didn’t report nonconsensual sexual penetration by force, and at U-M, 76.8 percent didn’t report it, the Detroit Free Press reports.

Of those who didn’t report, 61 percent of Michigan State and 62 percent of U-M students said they didn’t think the assaults were serious enough to report, according to the nationwide Association of American Universities Campus Climate Survey. At MSU, 30 percent said they didn’t think the reports would be investigated, and at U-M, more than a third — 37 percent — lacked confidence in the follow-up.

Nationally, nearly one in four female students — 23.1 percent — reported they had been victims of sexual assault and sexual misconduct due to physical force, threats of physical force, or incapacitation, including 10.8 percent who experienced penetration.

Other key findings:

• Overall, 11.7 percent of student respondents across the 27 universities surveyed reported experiencing nonconsensual sexual contact by physical force, threats of physical force or incapacitation since they enrolled at their university.
• Overall rates of reporting to campus officials and law enforcement or others were low, ranging from 5 percent to 28 percent, depending on the specific type of behavior.
• The most commonly cited reason for not reporting sexual assaults or sexual misconduct was that victims didn’t think they were serious enough. Other reasons were that they were “embarrassed, ashamed or that it would be too emotionally draining,” and because they “did not think anything would be done about it.”
• More than six in 10 student respondents — 63.3 percent — believe that a report of sexual assault or sexual misconduct would be taken seriously by campus officials.

At Michigan State, Paulette Granberry Russell, the university’s Title IX coordinator and senior adviser to the president, said in a statement that sexual assault is “vastly underreported” both at Michigan State and nationally.

U-M President Mark Schlissel expressed similar dismay at the findings.

“In all cases, the numbers are too high,” Schlissel said in a statement. “We must address sexual misconduct at the University of Michigan, on all other college campuses and throughout our society. Even one instance is unacceptable. This research is vital to our understanding of the problem.”

Related

• Michigan Schools Under the Microscope for Handling of Sexual Assault Investigations
• Michigan State Mishandled Sexual Assault Complaints: DOE Report