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One in Four College Women Report Unwanted Sexual Contact: Survey

Almost 25 percent of undergraduate women have been victims of sexual contact or assault, according to an Association of American Universities Campus Climate survey.
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/ Source: The Associated Press

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Nearly a quarter of undergraduate women surveyed at more than two dozen universities say they experienced unwanted sexual contact sometime during college, according to a report released Monday.

The results of the Association of American Universities Campus Climate Survey come at a time of heightened scrutiny of the nation's colleges and universities and what they are doing to combat sexual assault. Just last week, Vice President Joe Biden visited Ohio State University to highlight several new initiatives, including mandatory sexual violence awareness training for the school's freshmen beginning next year.

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The survey was sent this spring to nearly 780,000 students at the association's member colleges, plus one additional university. About 150,000 participated in the online questionnaire.

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The results were generally in line with past surveys on sexual assault and misconduct on college campuses — and confirmed that alcohol and drugs are important risk factors.

"How many surveys will it take before we act with the urgency these crimes demand?" said Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-New York, who is pushing for passage of a bill that would address how sexual assault cases are handled on campus and the resources available to help students.

Researchers cautioned against generalizations from the data, partly because experiences of different students and at different schools could vary widely. It was not a representative sample of all the nation's colleges and universities.

Some students attended schools that have recently grappled with reports of sexual assaults or misconduct, including the University of Virginia, the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Ohio State.

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University of Virginia President Teresa A. Sullivan has said that a widely discredited and later retracted Rolling Stone magazine story about a gang-rape at a fraternity house harmed efforts to fight sexual violence and tarred the school's reputation. Hazing that included excessive underage drinking and sexualized conduct prompted the University of Wisconsin-Madison to terminate a fraternity chapter earlier this year. And Ohio State fired its marching band director last year after an internal investigation turned up a "sexualized culture" of rituals and traditions inside the celebrated organization.

The Obama administration has taken steps to push colleges to better tackle the problem of sexual assault, including releasing the names of 55 colleges and universities last year that were facing Title IX investigations for their handling of such cases.

Participating schools said survey results will bolster their ongoing efforts. Dartmouth said Monday it will form a committee of students, faculty and staff to analyze the data, as well as conduct its own attitudes survey starting in October.

Image: McCaskill and Gillibrand
Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., left, and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., testify during the Senate Judiciary Committee Crime and Terrorism Subcommittee hearing on "Campus Sexual Assault: the Roles and Responsibilities of Law Enforcement" on Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2014.Bill Clark / CQ Roll Call via AP Images

Gregory Fenves, president of The University of Texas at Austin, said, "It is essential that we foster a campus that does not tolerate sexual assaults while strongly encouraging victims to come forward and report incidents."

Overall, 23 percent of undergraduate women at the participating universities said they had been physically forced — or threatened with force — into nonconsensual sexual contact. For undergraduate men, the percentage was 5 percent.

Freshman women appeared to be at greater risk than older students for the most serious sexual assaults — those involving penetration. About 17 percent of freshman females said they had been victims of this type of assault. For women asked about their senior year, the percentage was about 11 percent.

The survey provided a rare glimpse into the experiences of the small percentage of students who are transgender or who don't identify as either male or female. Undergraduates in that category reported the highest rate of the most serious nonconsensual acts.

"Our universities are working to ensure their campuses are safe places for students," AAU President Hunter Rawlings said in a statement. "The primary goal of the survey is to help them better understand the experiences and attitudes of their students with respect to this challenge."