Every third woman in Austria has experienced physical or sexual violence since the age of 15. This is according to a survey by Statistics Austria, which was presented on Friday as part of the launch of the awareness campaign “16 days against violence”. Nearly one in six adult women has been subjected to threats of physical violence. Many women experience different forms of violence at the same time – from assault to stalking.
According to Statistics Austria, 761,786 women over the age of 15 were victims of physical violence within or outside of intimate relationships (23.47 percent), almost the same number of women also experienced sexual violence (23.75 percent). 1,119,934 women between the ages of 18 and 74 were affected by at least one of the two forms of violence. That’s 34.5 percent of all women of this age. 282,480 of all women aged 15 and older in Austria (8.7 percent) have already been raped. Nearly half a million Austrians (15.25 percent) were threatened with physical violence.
More than 6000 women interviewed
The study used a sample of 6,240 women aged 18 to 74 living in private households. They were interviewed from October 2020 to March 2021. The survey was commissioned by Eurostat and the Federal Chancellery.
The statistics also show that in more than half a million cases the aggression comes from one’s own partner. The proportion of victims of violence who are currently in a partnership or have ever been in a relationship is 16.4 percent. Of the women who have experienced physical or sexual violence in a previous relationship, more than half have also suffered physical injury.
Surprisingly many repetitions
In addition, according to Statistics Austria, 8.3 percent of women in an active or previous relationship stated that they had been threatened with physical violence in an intimate relationship. Nearly 37 percent have experienced psychological violence in a partnership. The pattern is especially striking in conflict-ridden relationships: More than 81 percent of all women who experienced physical violence in previous partnerships reported repeated assaults in new relationships. About half of rape or attempted rape cases are recidivism. More than 7.7 percent of women experience violence in more than one relationship.
According to Statistics Austria, more than a quarter of all women have also experienced violence outside intimate relationships. Four percent have been victims of rape by strangers. Stalking affected every fifth woman between the ages of 18 and 74 in Austria. That’s nearly 710,000 women who received unwanted messages or gifts, obscene, threatening or silent phone calls. 736,613 women in Germany have experienced sexual harassment at work. That’s more than every fourth woman who has worked at least once. The most common forms of workplace sexual harassment are inappropriate looks or lustful looks, sexual jokes or offensive comments about their bodies or private lives, and unwanted physical contact.
Genital mutilation is on the rise
Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), to which an estimated 200 million women worldwide are exposed, is also becoming an increasingly important problem in Austria. Female genital mutilation in childhood is particularly widespread in the Sahel zone and in Northeast Africa, in Indonesia, but also in parts of the Arabian Peninsula. In a broadcast on Friday, the Red Cross estimated the number of affected girls and women in Austria to be between 6,000 and 8,000.
Source: Krone
I am Wallace Jones, an experienced journalist. I specialize in writing for the world section of Today Times Live. With over a decade of experience, I have developed an eye for detail when it comes to reporting on local and global stories. My passion lies in uncovering the truth through my investigative skills and creating thought-provoking content that resonates with readers worldwide.
