Separation/Divorce Sexual Assault

Since the 1970s, social scientists have greatly enhanced an empirical and theoretical understanding of various types of woman abuse in ongoing heterosexual relationships. However, although it is known that breaking up with a violent man is one of the most dangerous events in a woman's life, relatively little attention has been paid to the victimization of women who want to leave, are in the process of leaving, or who have left their marital or cohabiting partners. The limited work that has been done on this topic has focused on lethal and nonlethal forms of physical violence, such as murders and beatings. Male-to-female abuse is multidimensional in nature, and a few studies show that women are also at high risk of being sexually assaulted during and after separation/divorce. Still, almost all of the research on this problem is found in the small amount of feminist literature on what is variously termed marital rape, spousal rape, wife rape, or sexual assault in marriage. Further, little attention is paid in this literature to the plight of cohabiting women who exit or try to exit relationships, and the bulk of the data reported were gathered from urban samples.

Perhaps the only North American study on this topic was specifically designed to glean rich information on separation/divorce sexual assault. Funded by the National Institute of Justice and conducted by a research team led by DeKeseredy, this exploratory qualitative study was done in three rural Ohio counties, and the sample consists of 43 women. Rather than using a narrow definition of sexual assault limited to only forced penetration, the study focused on a wide range of sexually abusive behaviors, including assaults when women were drunk or high or when they were unable to give consent. Sex out of obligation and what Russell refers to as “blackmail rapes” were also examined.

Many findings were uncovered, but those deemed the most important are briefly described here. First, only a few of the 43 respondents experienced just one of the four types of sexual assault examined, and virtually all experienced rape or attempted rape. Second, 80% of the women were victimized by two or more forms of non-sexual abuse, such as physical violence, harm to animals or prized possessions, and psychological abuse. Nineteen percent of the sample also reported that their partners abused their children, and one woman believes that her expartner raped her as a means of killing her unborn child.

Other key findings include the fact that 74% of the sample were sexually abused when they expressed a desire to leave a relationship. Forty-nine percent were harmed this way while they were trying to leave or while they were leaving, and 33% were victimized after they left. And 67% of the women reported on a variety of ways in which their partners' male peers perpetuated and legitimated separation/divorce sexual assault. Three methods in particular stand out: frequently drinking with sexist male friends, informational support, and attachment to abusive peers. Informational support refers to the guidance and advice that influences men to sexually, physically, and psychologically abuse their female partners, and attachment to abusive peers is defined as having male friends who also abuse women. These factors are identical to those found to be highly significant in predicting which men on college campuses will admit to being sexual predators.

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