Sexual victimisation and stalking

Scotland's Chief Statistician has published statistics on adults' experiences of sexual victimisation and stalking in Scotland.

The report covers several forms of stalking and sexual victimisation.

• Stalking and harassment includes receiving obscene or threatening correspondence; receiving obscene, threatening, nuisance or silent telephone calls, someone waiting outside the home or workplace; being followed around or watched;
• Less serious sexual assault includes indecent exposure; sexually threatening behaviour; touching sexually when it was not wanted;
• Serious sexual assault includes forcing / attempting to force someone to have sexual intercourse or forcing / attempting to force someone to take part in other sexual activity when they did not want to.

The main findings show that:

• 5% of adults had experienced at least one form of stalking and harassment in the last 12 months - the same as the level in 2009/10 but lower than the 6% recorded in 2008/09,
• the risk of experiencing stalking and harassment was 5% for men and 6% for women,
• younger age groups were more likely than older age groups to experience stalking and harassment (11% of 16-24 year olds had experienced at least one form of stalking and harassment in the last 12 months compared with 2% of those aged 60 or over),
• 62% of those who experienced stalking and harassment in the last 12 months knew the offender, 12% had seen the offender before but did not know them and 23% did not know the offender at all, and
• 22% of those who experienced stalking and harassment said the police came to know about the most recent / only incident they experienced in the last 12 months.