Girls and Women

S2S Definition

Individuals who identify as female, including those who are biologically female, trans women, and trans girls.

Why is this Group at Risk?

    • Interpersonal and societal hostility towards women
    • Hypermasculinity, toxic masculinity, and other aggressive masculine behaviors are taken out on women 
    • Pressure to adhere to traditional gender role norms affects the way both men and women act, creating situations in which women feel the need to have sex or are forced to have sex after they have said no. 
    • College students who are members of sororities are more likely to experience sexual violence 
    • Women on college campuses are more likely to be victims if they:
      • Experienced physically forced sexual assault before entering college.
      • Have experienced dating violence since entering college.
      • Are Hispanic (compared to white non-Hispanics).
      • Have had more dating partners since entering college.
    • Women of Color are more likely to experience sexual violence than white women 
    • Having more sexual partners
    • Woman who have consumed alcohol (and are therefore unable to give consent) have a greater chance of being sexually assaulted  
    • Immigrant women are at greater risk of sexual assault
    • Lower levels of education, a history of exposure to child maltreatment, and witnessing family violence affect both the perpetrator and the woman or girl experiencing violence 
    • Community and societal norms privilege or ascribe higher status to men and lower status to women
    • Women have low levels of access to paid employment 
    • Low level of gender equality and discriminatory laws
  • Source

Where to Get Help?

United States
Canada

  • Assaulted Women’s Helpline (toll free): Toll-free: 1-866-863-0511

    Call 211 for Ontario’s Community and Social Services network for non emergent and life threatening help.

    • Canadian Resource Centre for Victims of Crime
    • Ontario Women’s Justice Network
      • “The Ontario Women’s Justice Network (OWJN) is METRAC’s legal information website. OWJN tries to help survivors of violence and their supporters better understand legal rights in Ontario. We do not give legal advice. The website offers accessible legal information in a way that reflects the diverse experiences and realities of women.”
    • Canadian Women’s Foundation
    • Support for women, girls, two-spirit and non-binary people across Canada to address issues facing specifically these populations

Statistics

United States
  • “91% of the victims of rape and sexual assault are female.”
  • Young women are especially at risk of sexual violence (ages 12-34).
    • “Females ages 16-19 are 4 times more likely than the general population to be victims of rape, attempted rape, or sexual assault.”
    • Source
  • “1 out of every 6 American women has been the victim of and attempted or completed rape in her lifetime.”
  • “Nearly 1 in 5 women have experienced completed or attempted rape during their lifetime.”
    • “1 in 3 female rape victims experienced it for the first time between 11-17 years old.”
    • “1 in 8 female rape victims reported that it occurred before age 10.”
    • “1 in 4 girls experience sexual abuse in childhood.”
    • Source
  • “As of 1998, an estimated 17.7 million American women had been victims of attempted or completed rape.”
  • According to  NIJ’s Campus Sexual Assault Study, as of September 2008, “Almost a quarter of sexual assault victims were sorority members, whereas only 14 percent of nonvictims were sorority members.”
  • “46.4% lesbians, 74.9% bisexual women and 43.3% heterosexual women reported sexual violence other than rape during their lifetimes”
  • “Nearly one in 10 women has been raped by an intimate partner in her lifetime, including completed forced penetration, attempted forced penetration or alcohol/drug-facilitated completed penetration.”
  • “Health care is 16% higher for women who were sexually abused as children.”
Canada
  • “Women’s risk of violent victimization was about 20% higher than men’s in 2014, according to self-reported data from the General Social Survey on Victimization.”
  • In about 80% of cases, the sexual assault survivor knows the offender.
  • “The percentage of offenses that were reported to the police dropped from about 12% in 2009[51] to 5% in 2014.”
  • “Women were more likely than men to have been sexually assaulted or have experienced unwanted sexual behaviour in public, unwanted behaviour online, or unwanted behaviour in the workplace in the 12 months preceding the survey.”
  • “According to data collected for the 2011 UCR report, the five most common violent offences committed against women, and reported to police, were: common assault (49%), uttering threats (13%), serious assault (10%), sexual assault level I (7%), and criminal harassment (7%) (Sinha, 2013).”
  • “The 2009 GSS indicated that the rate of sexual assault against women aged 15 to 24 is almost double the rate for women aged 25 to 34, and more than 3.5 times the rate for women aged 35 to 44 and women aged 45 to 54 (Perreault, & Brennan, 2010).”
A Deeper Look

  • Domestic and family violence often go hand in hand with sexual violence and assault. Here are a few statistics about women and girls experiencing violence, that may in part also be sexual violence. To learn more about domestic and intimate partner violence in relation to sexual assault, please click here.

Canadian Statistics

  • “7 in 10 people who experience family violence are women and girls.”
  • “Women are about four times as likely as men to be victims of intimate partner homicide.”
  • “About 80% of victims of dating violence are women.”
  • “Girls are 1.5 times more likely than boys to experience violence at home.”