If an adult woman wants to take the NVAWS data to perform risk analysis, here's some data to consider:
Over half the women were raped before age 18. Those raped as minors were twice as likely to be raped as adults. So, of the women over the age of 18 and having never been raped before, about 8.5% will be raped (1 in ~12).
Of all the adult victims, the perpetrator was:
Intimate Partner: 62%
Relative Other Than Spouse: 9%
Acquaintance: 21%
Stranger: 19%
(totals over 100% because of multiple perpetrators)
Unfortunately, the study didn't break down intimate partner into spouse, live-in partner, and date/boyfriend (current/former) for the adult category. They broke it down for all victims (includes minors), and for minors, 87% were raped by a relative other than spouse.
So, if we do some math we find the following odds for an adult woman who was not raped as a minor:
Intimate Partner: 1 in 19
Acquaintance: 1 in 56
Spouse: 1 in 58 (I assumed that the number of minors with spouses was small enough to ignore, and spouses are included in the Intimate Partner number)
Stranger: 1 in 62
Relative other than spouse: 1 in 130
This next part is where it gets tricky because we don't really have any data for the number of intimate partners, relatives, acquaintances and strangers a person will have/meet. I would say it's reasonable to consider intimate partners to be the smallest group. The number acquaintances one has I would say dwarfs intimate partners and the number of strangers one encounters dwarfs the number of acquaintances.
My point about the number of people encountered is this: Suppose a woman in her lifetime goes on dates with 25 different men (I pulled this number out of my ass, but it seems to be
reasonable). These 25 men by far pose the greatest risk to her, yet it seems to me this is the group of men that women are the least concerned about. By contrast a woman encounters countless strangers in her lifetime, and they represent the least amount of risk outside of relatives. This, it seems, is the group women are most concerned about.
Stated another way, she's much more likely to be raped by one of the 25 men she dates than the thousands of stranger whom she encounters in her lifetime. Of course, an intimate partner starts out as a stranger and most likely passes through the acquaintance stage.
Of all the adult rapes, about 67% of the perpetrators were using drugs/alcohol at the time. About 20% of the victims were using drugs/alcohol at the time. There is no data indicating when both were using drugs/alcohol at the time. Interestingly, the study Hans referenced about self-described male rapists indicated that 70% of the men who admitted rape did so on intoxicated women. It's apples and oranges to a degree since this was a study of college men, but I offer it for the purposes of risk assessment.
About 32% reported being threatened with harm to themselves or someone close to them. About 43% reported feeling threatened with harm to themselves or someone close to them. Stated another way about 57% of the rapes didn't involve any threat of additional physical harm. About 32% reported physical injury, which means 68% did not. Of those who did get injured, about 35% were serious injuries and 75% were minor cuts, scratches, bruises (totals over 100% because of multiple injuries).
We can only sort of put this all together because the data is not granular enough, but in general it seems that women who are raped are most likely to be raped by the small group of men with whom they have relationships and those rapes don't match the "traditional stereotype" some perceive of a violent physical confrontation. Maybe we can coin a new term and call them stealth rapes.
About 82% of rape victims did
not report it to police. Of those, 18% considered it a "minor incident; not a crime or police matter," which works out to be 1 in 100 women being raped in their adult lifetime and judging it that way. Another 13% said they didn't report it, "Police could not do anything," which is somewhat vague. Not included in those percentages are the 22% who refused to answer or said, "I don't know." Can't do much beyond speculating with those numbers. About 22% did not report it because they feared the rapist.
Finally, for those who were raped by intimate partners, about 88% of the rapes happened during the relationship. About 6% happened only after the relationship. About 25% happened both during and after the relationship.
To me this seems to indicate that women should be most concerned about those with whom they date or otherwise have relationships. A woman is about as likely be raped by her spouse as she is a stranger.
