NCJ Number
162057
Journal
Criminal Justice and Behavior Volume: 23 Issue: 1 Dated: (March 1996) Pages: 55-69
Date Published
1996
Length
15 pages
Annotation
Although the past 20 years have seen changes in the statutory definition of rape and its investigation and adjudication, for most of the period those responsible for measuring rape victimization in national and international crime surveys have clung to inadequate rape screening methods.
Abstract
Because victimization estimates have failed to accurately capture the incidence of rape, independent researchers have tried to fill the data vacuum, a situation that has precluded a cumulative database and promoted an antirape backlash. Flawed data do not serve policy needs and fuel a negative recovery climate for rape victims. The author believes it is time for U.S. victimization statistics to measure rape with the same precision accorded other crimes and to communicate more openly to the public the limitations of crime survey methods used to detect intimate violence including rape. Methods used in the National Victims Center's 1992 survey of 4,008 women in the United States, the International Crime Survey, and a social survey of criminal victimization in Canada are examined. 37 references and 1 note