Violent behavior that takes place in the context of dating or courtship is not a rare event. Below are relevant statistics. The following statistics were compiled by the federal Office on the Administration for Children and Families generally for dating violence across all cultures. Studies specifically for Asian Pacific Islander youth and young adults have yet to be complied. For more information refer to their website: www.acf.hhs.gov

• A review of dating violence research among male and female high school students, found that prevalence rates of non-sexual, courtship violence range from 9 percent to 65 percent, depending on whether threats and emotional or verbal aggression were included in the definition (Sugarman & Hotalerg, 1989).
• Data from a study of 8th and 9th grade male and female students indicated that 25 percent had been victims of non-sexual dating violence and 8 percent had been victims of sexual dating violence (Fositee, et. al., 1996).
• Summarizing many studies, the average prevalence rate for non-sexual dating violence is 22 percent among male and female high school students and 32 percent among college students. Females are somewhat more likely than males to report being victims of violence (Sugarman/Hotalerg, 1989).
• In a national study of college students, 27.5 percent of the women surveyed said that they suffered rape or attempted rape at least once since age 14. Only 5 percent of those experiences were reported to the police. The term “hidden rape” has emerged because this survey and many other studies found that sexual assaults are seldom reported to the police (Koss, 1987/Kilpatrick 1985).
• Over half of a representative sample of more than 1,000 female students at a large urban university had experienced some form of unwanted sex. Twelve percent of these acts were perpetrated by casual dates and 43 percent by steady dating partners (Abbey, 1996).
• Studies of college students and high school students suggest that both males and females inflict and receive dating violence in equal proportion, but the motivation for violence by women is more often for defensive purposes. Other studies have found that women and girls were victims of dating violence twice as often as men and boys, and that females suffer significantly more injury than males (Arias, 1987; White, 1991; Makepeace, 1996).
• Nearly half of the 500,000 rapes and sexual assaults reported to the police by women of all ages were committed by friends or acquaintances; 80 percent to 95 percent of the rapes that occur on college campuses are committed by someone known to the victim (Abbey, 1996, 1991).