CHArACTERISTICS AND ASSOCIATED FACTOrS OF SELF-REPORTED SEXUAL AGGRESSION IN THE BELGIAN POPULATION AGED 16-69
Sexual violence is a major public health, societal, and judicial problem worldwide. Studies investigating the characteristics of its perpetrators often rely on samples of convicted offenders, which are then biased by low reporting and conviction rates of sexual offenses. Self-report studies in the general population are a way of resolving this, but they also have their shortcomings. The reliability of self-report studies of undetected sexual offenders is, for example, threatened by underreporting of sexually aggressive acts. Despite their limitations, we argue that it is important to publish available data on self-reported sexual aggression to learn more about those who are more likely to report their own sexual aggression and to further improve self-report methods.
Based on a self-report study in the Belgian general population aged 16 to 69 (n = 4,687), we provide
lifetime and past-year prevalence rates of sexual aggression and report the characteristics of the events, including type, target, and the applied coercion strategies. A logistic regression analysis revealed factors associated with self-disclosed sexual aggression. Almost 4% (n = 166) of all participants reported to have committed at least one incident of hands-on sexual aggression. Men were more likely than women to report sexual aggression (aOR: 5.47 (95% CI: 3.70-8.10)). Furthermore, a history of sexual victimization was associated with sexual aggression. In most cases, the target was an (ex)partner or friend. About 4 in 5 perpetrators indicated that none of the given coercion strategies (i.e., force, threat, verbal pressure, or exploiting the victim’s incapacitation or the own position of authority) applied to their incident.
Future research should use behaviorally specific questions that take the perpetrator’s perspective into account to limit interpretation ambiguity which could reduce unintentional non-disclosure of sexual
aggression.