Unmarried women aged 18-24 who have been sexually abused as a child and have experienced violence as an adult face a 44 per cent chance of being sexually assaulted or threatened with sexual assault in the next 12 months. On the other hand, married women aged 45-55 years who have no prior adult violence and no child sexual abuse face a one per cent chance of being sexually assaulted or threatened with sexual assault in the next twelve months. Childhood physical and sexual abuse emerged from the Bureau's analysis as key predictors of adult physical violence, sexual violence and emotional abuse. Women who have experienced childhood physical abuse are more than twice as likely to suffer physical violence and emotional abuse in the next twelve months than women who have not suffered physical abuse as a child. They are also nearly twice as likely to have suffered multiple incidents of violence since the age of 15.
Similar findings apply to sexual abuse.
Women who experienced sexual abuse as a child are twice as likely as women who did not experience such abuse to experience sexual violence in the next twelve months. It has long been known that people who experience physical or sexual abuse as children are at increased risk, as adults, of abusing their own children. It is true that violence against women occurs across the social and demographic spectrum. These findings have important practical implications.