Almost five million Spanish women between 16 and 74 years old (28.7%) have been victims of some type of violence (psychological, physical, sexual) as a partner or ex-partner on some occasion. One million in the last twelve months. It is young women, those between 18 and 29 years old, who most report having suffered sexist violence. Specifically, 909,941 (just over 38%) of women of that age have had a partner at some time. On the opposite side, only 19% (468,062) of women between 65 and 74 years old who have had a partner report this type of violence.
The explanation, according to the Ministry of Equality, is not that there are now more attacks than before, but that young women have greater knowledge, while the perception of violence in the couple is lower as age increases.
This is revealed by the European Gender Violence Survey 2022 (EEVG), the first survey on violence against women carried out within the framework of the European Statistical System (ESS), whose coordination is carried out by Eurostat (European Commission), the office statistics of the European Union.
The survey analyzes the sociodemographic characteristics of the victims and reveals, contrary to the popular imagination, that the proportion of women who have suffered some type of violence in the couple with higher education is close to 31% and is only surpassed by those women with higher education. intermediate training (non-compulsory secondary), 32%. In contrast, 24.8% of the victims have a level of education of compulsory secondary, primary or lower.
Among the almost five million women who report having suffered gender violence, 27.8% claim to have suffered psychological violence; 12.7% physical violence, including threats; and 6.7% sexual violence.
For Equality, the greater prevalence of psychological aggression is explained because the violence carried out against women does not occur suddenly, but is the result of a longer process of psychological and psychological abuse that increases in intensity and frequency. .
Studies also confirm that whenever there is physical violence, psychological violence is also exercised.
However, there is a low self-perception of sexual violence in the partner or ex-partner, since, according to the survey, the victims still do not identify or are afraid to reveal the sexual violence that the partners or ex-partners have exercised against them.
"Rape culture and myths about sexual violence have represented in the collective imagination almost exclusively as sexual violence the most extreme sexual assaults, such as rape through the use of force, blurring other forms of sexual violence that are also carried out. in couple relationships," he warns. Among them, coercion or blackmail exercised against the couple to have sexual relations without their consent or the obligation to have sexual relations without the use of a condom, among others.
Regarding violence outside the couple, 20.2% of women between 16 and 74 years old claim to have been a victim of some type of aggression since the age of 15. Violence carried out "overwhelmingly by men", especially in the case of sexual violence (94.2% of the aggressors are men).
In the case of sexual violence, a slight increase in revealed and self-perceived violence is observed (13.7%). This is due, according to Igualdad, to the fact that the social, political and cultural context of recent years has placed sexual violence at the center of the agenda.
Cross-referencing data between the type of sexual violence and the type of relationship between victim and aggressor reveals that the closer the relationship between the two, the more serious the type of sexual violence.
Specifically, among women who reveal having suffered rape outside their relationship, 77.5% affirm that the aggressor was a known man.
