Rape survivors in South Africa: analysis of the baseline socio-demographic and health characteristics of a rape cohort (original) (raw)
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BMJ open, 2017
South Africa is a country known for its high levels of HIV infection and sexual violence. Although the interface between gender-based violence, HIV and mental health has been described, there are substantial gaps in knowledge of the medium-term and long-term health impact. The 2010 Global Burden of Disease study excluded many health outcomes associated with rape and other forms of gender-based violence because systematic reviews revealed huge gaps in data and poor evidence of health effects. This study aims to describe the incidence and attributable burden of physical and mental health problems (including HIV acquisition) in adult women over a 2-year postrape period, through comparison with a cohort of women who have not been raped. The study will substantially advance our understanding of the impact of rape and will generate robust data to assist in the development of postrape health services and the delivery of evidence-based care. This longitudinal study seeks to recruit 1008 rap...
Rape perpetration by young, rural South African men: Prevalence, patterns and risk factors
Social Science & Medicine, 2006
Sexual violence is a well-recognised global health problem, but there has been remarkably little research on men as perpetrators. The objectives of this paper are to describe the prevalence, patterns and factors associated with rape of an intimate partner and a woman who was not a partner with men aged 15-26 years in rural South Africa.
BMC public health, 2015
Studies of rape of women seldom distinguish between men's participation in acts of single and multiple perpetrator rape. Multiple perpetrator rape (MPR) occurs globally with serious consequences for women. In South Africa it is a cultural practice with defined circumstances in which it commonly occurs. Prevention requires an understanding of whether it is a context specific intensification of single perpetrator rape, or a distinctly different practice of different men. This paper aims to address this question. We conducted a cross-sectional household study with a multi-stage, randomly selected sample of 1686 men aged 18-49 who completed a questionnaire administered using an Audio-enhanced Personal Digital Assistant. We attempted to fit an ordered logistic regression model for factors associated with rape perpetration. 27.6 % of men had raped and 8.8 % had perpetrated multiple perpetrator rape (MPR). Thus 31.9 % of men who had ever raped had done so with other perpetrators. An or...
Abstract Objective: To describe the prevalence and patterns of rape perpetration in a randomly selected sample of men from the general adult population, to explore factors associated with rape and to describe how men explained their acts of rape. Design: Cross-sectional household study with a two- stage randomly selected sample of men. Methods: 1737 South African men aged 18–49 completed a questionnaire administered using an Audio-enhanced Personal Digital Assistant. Multivariable logistic regression models were built to identify factors associated with rape perpetration. Results: In all 27.6% (466/1686) of men had raped a woman, whether an intimate partner, stranger or acquaintance, and whether perpetrated alone or with accomplices, and 4.7% had raped in the last 12 months. First rapes for 75% were perpetrated before age 20, and 53.9% (251) of those raping, did so on multiple occasions. The logistic regression model showed that having raped was associated with greater adversity in childhood, having been raped by a man and higher maternal education. It was associated with less equitable views on gender relations, having had more partners, and many more gender inequitable practices including transactional sex and physical partner violence. Also drug use, gang membership and a higher score on the dimensions of psychopathic personality, namely blame externalisation and Machiavellian egocentricity. Asked about why they did it, the most common motivations stemmed from ideas of sexual entitlement. Conclusions: Perpetration of rape is so prevalent that population-based measures of prevention are essential to complement criminal justice system responses. Our findings show the importance of measures to build gender equity and change dominant ideas of masculinity and gender relations as part of rape prevention. Reducing men’s exposure to trauma in childhood is also critically important.
Women’s Mobility and the Situational Conditions of Rape: Cases Reported to Hospitals
Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 2017
A third of all rapes in Stockholm, the capital of Sweden, take place in public outdoor places. Yet, little is known about the events that precede this type of sexual offence and less about the situational context of rape. This study aims to improve the understanding of the nature of situational conditions that immediately precede events of rape. Using medical records of 147 rape victims during 2012 and 2013, we constructed time- and place-specific records of the places women traveled through or spent time at, the activities they engaged in, and the people they interacted with sequentially over the course of the day when they were raped. The analysis uses visualization tools (VISUAL-TimePAcTS), Geographical Information Systems, and conditional logistic regression to identify place-, context-, and social interaction–related factors associated with the onset of rape. Results for this sample of cases reported to hospitals show that being outdoors was not necessarily riskier for women wh...
THE GLOBAL HEALTH BURDEN OF RAPE
Psychology of Women Quarterly, 1994
Women's rights to be free from male violence are now recognized by the United Nations as fundamental human rights. Two parallel transformations in the understanding of rape have been central to the international effort to achieve this declaration. The first i s increased recognition of the extent to which rape typically involves intimates. The second is the shift from regarding rape as a criminal justice matter towards an appreciation of its implications for women's health. The focus of this paper is the health burden of rape, which is addressed from the global perspective and includes discussion of its prevalence and psychological, sociocultural, somatic, and reproductive health consequences. Quantitative efforts to capture the relative economic impact of rape compared to other threats to women's health are also discussed. The paper concludes with an agenda for future research on rape that could enrich activists' efforts on behalf of women's health and development.
Consequences of Rape and a Framework to End Violence against Women
The study attempted to examine police registered rape cases through the contents of First Investigation Reports (FIRs) as rape is a phenomenon that has sever social and psychological consequences on the lives of survivors and in general on women. This was explored through ten in-depth interviews with the survivors. All the registered cases of one city of one year were included and 51 copies of FIRs were obtained from the police department. The contents of the FIRs were revealed that 94.16 % cases were reported from the urban slums of Lahore city. The highest risk age group during this year was 7-21years. In all the reported cases, six cases interviewed were children between the age group of 7-15. The survivors included in the FIRs were 39.2% housewives/girls, 25.5% students, 23.5% domestic servants and the rest were office workers and laborers. In all the cases 76.47% survivors were single, 17.64% were married and only 5.9 % were divorced. The results showed that 39.21% victims were raped at home during day time, 25.5 % at the workplace and 23.52% at rapist's place. The last 9.8 % raped incidents were happened at clinic/hospital. It showed that women are not safe at any place. They live in constant threat of rape that anywhere, anytime and anyone can rape them. The findings further revealed that 93.4% of the cases, the survivors knew the rapist on one or the other type of relation from acquaintance to ex-husband. The stranger committed only 5.9% rapes. During the interviews with the rape survivors it was found that rape was always planned in advance. All the survivors interviewed suffered from a wide range of consequences as a result of rape and survivors were more likely to avoid certain places. Rape was not only disgracing and traumatic experience for the victim but also for the whole family as purification of women has implications for cultural and religious identity. Lifestyles were affected as a result of the incident. Seeking justice is difficult in all the cases of rape, as 51 cases were reported to the police and none could get justice. These figures of violence against women depicted a situation which is alarming and the challenges are numerous. There is no one solution for addressing the challenges and reaching the objective to eradicate the violence against women. The preventive, protective and supportive framework is highly recommended to end violence against women in Pakistan.
Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, 2008
Although a pervasive problem that confronts females of all races and ages, studies show that some women are more likely to be rape victims than are others. Research reveals that certain behavioral and situational factors increase the risk of rape. To be most effective at reducing victimization, rape prevention programs and risk reduction interventions should target these behavioral and situational factors. A growing understanding of the relationships among these factors is evident, but to date what works to reduce vulnerability to rape remains somewhat obscure because of methodological weaknesses inherent in the limited number of published evaluations. Based on the current body of research, the authors offer suggestions regarding who should be targeted and what content should be included in rape prevention programs and risk reduction interventions to effectively reduce rape and its negative consequences.
Health care, legal interventions and women's responses to rape
2005
In South Africa, a country with a high incidence of sexual violence and HIV/AIDS, legal and health care efforts to address rape are hampered by financial and personnel constraints which prevent people from exercising their equal right to redress. The paper focuses on the response of women who apparently have access to these rights but seemingly fail to exercise them. It examines ways in which criminal, legal and rights narratives tend to diminish the complexity of the individual experiences of women and to exclude their inter-subjective positions within the communities where they live and must continue to survive. Even when great sensitivity is exercised, legal and health efforts fail to encompass the embodied response to rape that legal and health efforts seem to foreground for the survivors.