A survey conducted among 150,000 students at 27 American universities, including most of the Ivy League, has found that one in five - or about 20 percent of female undergraduates - were victims of sexual assault and misconduct.
The survey was conducted by Westat under the aegis of the Association of American Universities.
The survey received the highest responses from Harvard at 53.2 percent university-wide, out of which 57.4 percent respondents were undergraduates. Thirty-one percent of senior undergraduate females at Harvard University reported experiencing some form of "nonconsensual sexual contact" during their time at the school. The report comes at a time when Harvard is undergoing an investigation into its Title IX compliance. University President Drew G. Faust termed the results of the survey "deeply disturbing," according to The Harvard Crimson.
"The prevalence of such behavior runs counter to our most fundamental values. It threatens individual students, our learning environment and our sense of community," said Yale University President Peter Salovey, while finding the results "extremely disturbing," according to The Washington Post.
Some academics were skeptical about the results compiled. "If you take this data literally, it would suggest a violent crime rate at most campuses higher than in any city in the country. Which I think is somewhat dubious. We're talking about college students at elite institutions here. They understand what sexual assault is," said K.C. Johnson, a professor of history at a Brooklyn College who tracks college sexual assault and due-process issues, reports The Washington Post.
The survey was the first to distinguish between types of attacks and situations while enabling comparisons across institutions. "Providing this level of detail is fairly unique among the campus climate surveys." It was done "mostly by the request of the universities, to try to differentiate between incidents clearly quite different in nature," said David Cantor, vice president of Westat.
