In a 2000 research article from the Home Office, in England and Wales, around 1 in 20 women (5%) said that they had been raped at some point in their life from the age of 16 beyond.[5]
In 2011 the US Centers for Disease Control found that “nearly 20% of all women” suffered rape or attempted rape sometime in their life. More than a third of the victims were raped before the age of 18.[6]
A woman’s physiological response to sexual contact is involuntary. In some cases, women can become physically aroused, produce natural lubrication, and even experience orgasms against their will during rape.[7] One proposed explanation for this genital arousal in some women is that it acts as a preparatory mechanism which served in the past to protect women from genital injury during unwanted sex.[8] This is in line with previous research showing that many women show vaginal lubrication when exposed to a broad array of sexual stimuli (even that involving chimps) regardless of stated preferences and subjective feelings.[9]
Pregnancy may result from rape. The rate varies between settings and depends particularly on the extent to which non-barrier contraceptives are being used. A study of adolescents in Ethiopiafound that among those who reported being raped, 17% became pregnant after the rape,[10] a figure which is similar to the 15–18% reported by rape crisis centres in Mexico.[11][12] A longitudinal study in the United States of over 4000 women followed for 3 years found that the national rape related pregnancy rate was 5.0% per rape among victims aged 12–45 years, producing over 32,000 pregnancies nationally among women from rape each year.[13] Experience of coerced sex at an early age reduces a woman’s ability to see her sexuality as something over which she has control.[14][15][16][17]