This table provides metadata for the actual indicator available from US statistics closest to the corresponding global SDG indicator. Please note that even when the global SDG indicator is fully available from US statistics, this table should be consulted for information on national methodology and other US-specific metadata information.
| Actual indicator available | Estimated Number of Rape - Revised and Legacy Definitions Reported to the FBI UCR Program. |
|---|---|
| Actual indicator available - description | This table contains estimated volume numbers based on both the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program's legacy and revised definitions of rape. The data do not include other forms of violence other than rape. The data include all rapes reported to the FBI UCR Program and are not limited to intimate partner. In 2013, the FBI UCR Program initiated the collection of rape data under a revised definition and removed the term “forcible” from the offense name. Column heading Year - is the year the data represents. Column Heading Revised Rape Definitions are the estimates of data collected under the revised rape definition: Penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim. (This includes the offenses of rape, sodomy, and sexual assault with an object as converted from data submitted via the National Incident-Based Reporting System [NIBRS].) Column Heading Legacy Rape Definition are the estimates of data collected under the legacy rape definition: The carnal knowledge of a female forcibly and against her will Indicator data on sexual assault is available in the NIBRS; however, NIBRS currently represents less than 30% of the nation's population and nonresponse cannot be modeled to adjust for bias because statistical sampling methodologies were not used. |
| Date of national source publication | September 2017 |
| Method of computation | NA |
| Periodicity | Annual |
| Scheduled update by national source | |
| U.S. method of computation | Agencies submit data based on only one of these definitions. Within each population group size, the proportion of female rape victims was calculated from all NIBRS reports of rape, sodomy, and sexual assault with an object. For agencies that reported using the revised definition, the actual number of reported rapes was decreased by the calculated proportion to arrive at an estimate for the number of rapes using the legacy definition. Conversely, for agencies that reported using the legacy definition, the actual number of reported rapes was increased by the inverse of the proportion to arrive at an estimate for the number of rapes using the revised definition. |
| Comments and limitations | The data do not include other forms of violence other than rape. The data include all rapes reported to the FBI UCR Program and are not limited to intimate partner. In 2013, the Summary UCR definition of rape was changed to “penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim.” The new definition updated the 80-year-old historical definition of rape which was “carnal knowledge of a female forcibly and against her will.” Effectively, the revised definition expands rape to include both male and female victims and offenders, and reflects the various forms of sexual penetration understood to be rape, especially nonconsenting acts of sodomy, and sexual assaults with objects. https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/resource-pages/rape-addendum |
| Date metadata updated | November 2017 |
| Disaggregation geography | National |
| Unit of measurement | Estimated Volume Number |
| Disaggregation categories | NA |
| International and national references | https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016 |
| Time period | Annual |
| Scheduled update by SDG team |