Prevalence of Domestic Violence, Sexual Assault, Dating Violence, and Stalking

In hearings conducted between 1990 and 1994, Congress noted that violence against women was a problem of national scope and that the majority of crimes associated with domestic violence, sexual assault, and stalking were perpetrated against women. These hearings culminated in the enactment of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) in 1994 to address these issues on a national level. VAWA established grant programs within the Departments of Justice (DOJ) and Health and Human Services (HHS) for state, local, and Indian tribal governments and communities. These grants have various purposes, such as providing services to victims and training for law enforcement officers and prosecutors. The 2006 reauthorization of VAWA expanded existing grant programs and added new programs addressing, among other things, young victims, the housing and economic needs of victims, and the health care system's response to domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking. Although criminal justice, health, and domestic violence experts believe that valid and reliable estimates have the potential to be of use to policy makers, service providers, and researchers, there are concerns that current crime statistics do not provide a full assessment of the problem. The Violence Against Women and DOJ Reauthorization Act of 2005, enacted January 5, 2006, requires GAO to conduct a study and report on data indicating the prevalence of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking among men, women, youth, and children, as well as services available to these victims. We developed two objectives to respond to this mandate: (1) To what extent do national data collection efforts report prevalence of men, women, youth, and children who are victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking, and (2) What support services (e.g., counseling, medical, legal, etc.) are available to victims of these categories of crime and what are the number and characteristics of victims receiving these services by type of service. This report addresses the first objective. Our work on the second objective is ongoing.

Since 2001, the amount of national research that has been conducted on the prevalence of domestic violence and sexual assault has been limited, and even less research has been conducted on dating violence and stalking. No single, comprehensive effort currently exists that provides nationwide statistics on the prevalence of these four categories of crime among men, women, youth, and children. Rather, various national efforts address certain subsets of these crime categories among some segments of the population. Some of these national data collection efforts focus largely on incidence--the number of separate times a crime is committed against individuals during a specific time period--rather than prevalence--the unique number of individuals who were victimized during a specific time period. Obtaining both incidence and prevalence data is important for determining services to provide to victims of crimes. In addition, HHS noted that both types of data are important for determining the impact of violence and strategies to prevent it from occurring. The national data collection efforts we reviewed cannot provide a basis for combining their results to compute valid and reliable nationwide prevalence estimates because the efforts use varying definitions. Further, the national data collection efforts we reviewed cannot provide a basis for combining their results to compute valid and reliable nationwide prevalence estimates because the efforts have varying scopes in terms of the incidents and categories of victims that are included. Although perfect data may never exist because of the sensitivity of these crimes and the likelihood that not all occurrences will be disclosed, initiatives are under way to provide additional information related to the prevalence of these issues. In addition to these efforts, under an Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) grant, the University of New Hampshire is planning to conduct the National Study on Children's Exposure to Violence. If these efforts are completed as planned, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and DOJ will make progress in collecting information needed to determine the extent to which men, women, youth, and children are victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking. However, some information gaps will remain, particularly in the areas of dating violence among victims age 12 and older and stalking among victims under age 18. To cost-effectively address information gaps, it is important to consider additional costs that would be incurred in collecting new or different data as well as the usefulness of such data. It is equally important to consider the benefits resulting from the use of these data (different allocations of resources) and the availability of funds to collect such data (a cost-benefit analysis).

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

Director: Eileen R. Larence Team: Government Accountability Office: Homeland Security and Justice Phone: (202) 512-6510