Adverse Health Outcomes, Perpetrator Characteristics, and Sexual Violence Victimization Among U.S. Adult Males

Abstract

In the United States, an estimated three million men are victims of sexual violence each year, yet the majority of existing studies have evaluated the consequences and characteristics of victimization among women alone. The result has been a gap in the existing literature examining the physical and psychological consequences of sexual assault among men. The main objective of this study was to identify health outcomes, risk behaviors, and perpetrator/victim relationship characteristics among men who have experienced an attempted or completed sexual assault using data from the sexual violence module of the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System survey. A total of 59,511 male respondents participated in the sexual violence module, and the majority of participants were White (73.7%), between the ages of 35 to 44 years (19.8%), married (69.0%), graduated from college (34.6%), and had an annual household income of more than US$50,000 (49.9%). Stratified multivariate logistic regression models were conducted to test the associations between victimization and health outcomes and risk behaviors controlling for age, marital status, race/ethnicity, income, education, and other potential confounders. Results of these analyses suggest important associations between health and sexual violence victimization. Specifically, men who reported unwanted attempted intercourse and attempted and completed intercourse were more likely to report poor mental health, poor life satisfaction, activity limitations, and lower emotional and social support. The current study extends knowledge of consequences of male sexual violence by considering characteristics of sexual assault and by identifying associations between victimization and a broad range of health indicators.