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Secondary victimisation (or post crime victimisation [1] or double victimisation [2] ) refers to further victim-blaming from criminal justice authorities following a report of an original victimisation. [1]
Rates of victimisation in the United States are high, with an estimated 5.7 million individuals experiencing at least one victimisation in 2016. [3] Considering these are cases of criminal offences, the reported rates of violent victimisation are disproportionately low. Less than half (42%) report any violent crime of threatened or real force, such as physical assault, battery, or weapons offenses. Additionally, under a quarter (23%) report rape, childhood, or sexual assault to the police. Further, out of the portion that does report sexual assault or rape, about half describe the experience as upsetting, frustrating, and useless. [4] [5] Despite efforts to increase criminal reports of victimisation, authorities and law enforcement personnel often discount individuals’ violent experiences and fail to attend to both the necessary legal actions and interpersonal actions.
When institutions or criminal justice system personnel fail to support the victimized individual, victims are vulnerable to secondary victimisation. [6] While the appropriate and legal way to respond to primary victimisation is to report the event, authorities often deny, do not believe, or blame the victim (Campbell & Raja, 1999; Campbell & Raja, 2005). In turn, up to 90% of victims report experiencing negative social reaction and attribute the incident as a “second rape” or “second assault”. [7]
Research suggests that victim of sexual violence or assault are the least likely to receive support or resources following reporting. [7] This may be due to perceived lack of evidence, social stigma, and overall discomfort when dealing with sexual incidences.
In a study of rape victims undergoing prosecution for their assault, those who felt their detectives responded empathetically and with understanding were likelier to pursue prosecution, felt their experiences were important, and their cases deserved to be heard. [8] Empathetic and supportive responses from authorities could potentially improve mental and physical health in rape survivors and additionally, improve reporting rates and lessen judgmental attitudes from the criminal justice system. Because sexual violence is a sensitive subject for all parties, criminal justice personnel may avoid, ignore, or publicly misconstrue their opinions about the situation as an effort to separate themselves or cope with dangerous and uncomfortable situations. Studies suggest these misconceptions by the system may further damage individuals’ mental health and a safer world. [9] This could be combatted with accepting, non-accusatory perspectives, aiding in accuracy the sexual violence reports. Several authors speculate authorities’ supportive approach benefits the victim and promotes a just world. [9] [10] In this way, previous victims might report and seek appropriate resources in the future.
Those exposed to traumatic victimisation are vulnerable to experiencing secondary victimisation. If social needs such as empathy, support, and understanding are not met, individuals are prone to this phenomenon. While anybody who has experienced victimisation is susceptible to secondary victimisation, prevalence rates are significantly elevated for some populations. This includes females, children, racial and sexual minorities, and those sexually assaulted by an acquaintance or stranger. [11] [12] Moreover, those experiencing a certain type of violence are at increased likelihood to experience secondary victimisation. These include physical assault, sexual assault, and domestic violence [13] Notably, rape victims are at highest risk of secondary victimisation from the criminal justice system, with about half who report describing the process as distressing. [6] [14]
As a consequence of social rejections and insensitivities to acknowledging trauma or violence, individuals are increasingly apt to continue not reporting. [15] This can be detrimental to victims’ mental health, as sexual violence often happens more than once and not reporting violence helps to maintain a repeated cycle of abuse. [16] Experiencing violence is associated with negative mental and physical outcomes, including shame, emotion dysregulation, psychological stress, loss of resources, and mental health pathology. [17] In a meta-analysis about sexual assault victimisation and psychopathology, there was a medium-sized effect overall effect size was moderate after accounting for several mental health diagnoses including depression, anxiety, suicidality, disordered eating, and substance abuse. [16] This indicates that sexual assault victimisation is significantly related to mental health distress even after controlling for other associated symptoms. Additionally, women who experience secondary victimisation are likelier to have both adverse physical health and mental health implications and are also unlikely to seek services and treatment. [18] [12] Given these individuals are likely in a troubled state, pressures of reporting are cognitively taxing. To report crime, especially sexual crimes, implicates a further level of vulnerability. When victims are met with hostile reactions, they are reinforced to not report. This is not only harmful to the individual, but to society, in that perpetrators are thus permitted to continue committing crimes and abuse. As a consequence of victim-blaming and other negative attitudes towards victims, reported rates of criminal abuse are low and distress in victims is high. [15]
Despite high rates of secondary victimisation, reporting rates are low. It is not unusual for criminal justice personnel to discourage victims from prosecuting their sexual assault cases due to victim-blaming behaviors and discounting victims’ traumatic experiences. [19] [12] [20] One incident that attracts much controversy in the criminal justice system is reporting violent crimes on one's intimate partner. Women who report rape by an intimate partner are seen as less credible by the system and law enforcement are more likely to encourage dropping the case. [8] Societal standards of obeying an intimate partner and thus encompassing rape culture are prevalent in the criminal justice system. [8] Although it is a legal crime that is being reported, victims are often turned away feeling alienated, hopeless, and unworthy and have limited options for resources beyond the system. [17]
A possible explanation of why the criminal justice system is unlikely to believe many victims is due to victims’ fragmented memory. It is not uncommon for victims of sexual abuse to also have a traumatic brain injury or other neurobiological reactions due to assault. [21] [17] [12] In her work, Campbell explains how molecular changes occur in response to trauma, and how this can influence discrepancies in victims’ reports and recollections of the event. After a traumatic incident, chemical alterations in the brain change, impacting encoding and processing the memory [21]
Not only do neurobiological changes affect victims’ memories, but emotion dysregulation, repression, suppression, dissociation, and avoidance of the event are also common reactions in victims [22] [23] These cognitive and neurobiological factors are rarely considered when a victim reports an assault. [24] [21] During the time law enforcement personnel gather information about the event, they could be met with victims explaining their stories inconsistently due to a fragmented memory. Either by a neurobiological change or psychological response to particularly distressing trauma, victims may fall prey to the inability to coherently portray details of the event, thus taking away credibility and facilitating secondary victimisation. [20]
Sexual assault is an act in which one intentionally sexually touches another person without that person's consent, or coerces or physically forces a person to engage in a sexual act against their will. It is a form of sexual violence that includes child sexual abuse, groping, rape, drug facilitated sexual assault, and the torture of the person in a sexual manner.
A violent crime, violent felony, crime of violence or crime of a violent nature is a crime in which an offender or perpetrator uses or threatens to use harmful force upon a victim. This entails both crimes in which the violent act is the objective, such as murder, assault, rape and assassination, as well as crimes in which violence is used as a method of coercion or show of force, such as robbery, extortion and terrorism. Violent crimes may, or may not, be committed with weapons. Depending on the jurisdiction, violent crimes may be regarded with varying severities from homicide to harassment. There have been many theories regarding heat being the cause of an increase in violent crime. Theorists claim that violent crime is persistent during the summer due to the heat, further causing people to become aggressive and commit more violent crime.
Some victims of rape or other sexual violence incidents are male. It is estimated that approximately one in six men experienced sexual abuse during childhood. Historically, rape was thought to be, and defined as, a crime committed solely against females. This belief is still held in some parts of the world, but rape of males is now commonly criminalized and has been subject to more discussion than in the past.
Victim blaming occurs when the victim of a crime or any wrongful act is held entirely or partially at fault for the harm that befell them. There is historical and current prejudice against the victims of domestic violence and sex crimes, such as the greater tendency to blame victims of rape than victims of robbery if victims and perpetrators knew each other prior to the commission of the crime.
Prison rape commonly refers to the rape of inmates in prison by other inmates or prison staff. In 2001, Human Rights Watch estimated that at least 4.3 million inmates had been raped while incarcerated in the United States. A United States Department of Justice report, Sexual Victimization in Prisons and Jails Reported by Inmates, states that "In 2011–12, an estimated 4.0% of state and federal prison inmates and 3.2% of jail inmates reported experiencing one or more incidents of sexual victimization by another inmate or facility staff in the past 12 months or since admission to the facility, if less than 12 months." However, advocates dispute the accuracy of the numbers, saying they seem to under-report the real numbers of sexual assaults in prison, especially among juveniles.
Sex differences in crime are differences between men and women as the perpetrators or victims of crime. Such studies may belong to fields such as criminology, sociobiology, or feminist studies. Despite the difficulty of interpreting them, crime statistics may provide a way to investigate such a relationship from a gender differences perspective. An observable difference in crime rates between men and women might be due to social and cultural factors, crimes going unreported, or to biological factors for example, testosterone or sociobiological theories). The nature or motive of the crime itself may also require consideration as a factor.
Rape can be categorized in different ways: for example, by reference to the situation in which it occurs, by the identity or characteristics of the victim, and by the identity or characteristics of the perpetrator. These categories are referred to as types of rape. The types described below are not mutually exclusive: a given rape can fit into multiple categories, by for example being both a prison rape and a gang rape, or both a custodial rape and the rape of a child.
Rape is a traumatic experience that affects the victim in a physical, psychological, and sociological way. Even though the effects and aftermath of rape differ among victims, individuals tend to suffer from similar issues found within these three categories. Long-term reactions may involve the development of coping mechanisms that will either benefit the victim, such as social support, or inhibit their recovery. Seeking support and professional resources may assist the victim in numerous ways.
Rape is a type of sexual assault involving sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual penetration carried out against a person without their consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority, or against a person who is incapable of giving valid consent, such as one who is unconscious, incapacitated, has an intellectual disability, or is below the legal age of consent. The term rape is sometimes used interchangeably with the term sexual assault.
Victimisation is the state or process of being victimised or becoming a victim. The field that studies the process, rates, incidence, effects, and prevalence of victimisation is called victimology.
Research published from 2000 to 2020 illustrates increased prevalence rates of sexual violence against people with intellectual disabilities, compared to the general population.:61 The World Health Organization (WHO) funded a study which concluded that 15% of the adult population worldwide in 2012 had a disability, putting them at increased risk of physical, sexual, and intimate partner violence. Of that 15%, 6.1% had intellectual disability with 5.5% experiencing sexual violence. In another 2012 report, the WHO found that worldwide, children with intellectual disabilities experienced a 4.6 times greater risk of sexual violence than those without disability.
Campus sexual assault is the sexual assault, including rape, of a student while attending an institution of higher learning, such as a college or university. The victims of such assaults are more likely to be female, but any gender can be victimized. Estimates of sexual assault, which vary based on definitions and methodology, generally find that somewhere between 19–27% of college women and 6–8% of college men are sexually assaulted during their time in college.
Violence against men are violent acts that are disproportionately or exclusively committed against men or boys. Men are over-represented as both victims and perpetrators of violence.
Mary P. Koss is an American Regents' Professor at the University of Arizona, Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health in Tucson, Arizona. Her best known works have been in the areas of gender-based violence and restorative justice.
Although fear of crime is a concern for people of all genders, studies consistently find that women around the world tend to have much higher levels of fear of crime than men, despite the fact that in many places, and for most offenses, men's actual victimization rates are higher. Fear of crime is related to a perceived risk of victimization, but is not the same; fear of crime may be generalized instead of referring to specific offenses, and perceived risk may also be considered a demographic factor that contributes to fear of crime. Women tend to have higher levels for both perceived risk and fear of crime.
The feminist pathways perspective is a feminist perspective of criminology which suggests victimization throughout the life course is a key risk factor for women's entry into offending.
Rape myths are prejudicial, stereotyped, and false beliefs about sexual assaults, rapists, and rape victims. They often serve to excuse sexual aggression, create hostility toward victims, and bias criminal prosecution.
Rebecca Campbell is a professor of psychology at Michigan State University. She is known for her research pertaining to sexual assault and violence against women and children and the effects of treatment by law enforcement and medical staff on victims' psychological and physiological well-being. Campbell has been involved in criminal justice research on the investigation of Detroit's untested rape kits, wherein DNA evidence obtained in thousands of rape kits was left in storage and not analyzed. She has received numerous awards for her work including the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues Louise Kidder Early Career Award (2000), the American Psychological Association (APA) Early Career Award for Distinguished Contributions to Psychology in the Public Interest (2008), the APA Division 27 Council on Educational Program's Excellent Educator Award (2015), and the U.S. Department of Justice Vision 21 Crime Victims Research Award (2015).
Sexual assault of LGBT people, also known as sexual and gender minorities (SGM), is a form of violence that occurs within the LGBT community. While sexual assault and other forms of interpersonal violence can occur in all forms of relationships, it is found that sexual minorities experience it at rates that are equal to or higher than their heterosexual counterparts. There is a lack of research on this specific problem for the LGBT population as a whole, but there does exist a substantial amount of research on college LGBT students who have experienced sexual assault and sexual harassment.
A juvenile sex crime is defined as a legally proscribed sexual crime committed without consent by a minor under the age of 18. The act involves coercion, manipulation, a power imbalance between the perpetrator and victim, and threats of violence. The sexual offenses that fall under juvenile sex crimes range from non-contact to penetration. The severity of the sexual assault in the crime committed is often the amount of trauma and/or injuries the victim has suffered. Typically within these crimes, female children are the majority demographic of those targeted and the majority of offenders are male. Juvenile sex offenders are different than adult sex offenders in a few ways, as captured by National Incident Based Reporting System: they are more likely to be committed in school, offend in groups and against acquaintances, target young children as victims, and to have a male victim, whereas they are less likely than their adult counterpart to commit rape.
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