Risk Factors
Commonly cited risk factors for sexual victimization for persons with disabilities include:5
- Type of disability
- Gender
- Negative public attitudes toward persons with disabilities that lead sex offenders to view them as easy targets and think it unlikely that their actions will result in a conviction
- Social isolation
- Communication barriers
- Lack of accessible transportation
- Reliance on others for care, assistance with personal needs and/or management of their affairs
- Learned compliance of people with disabilities
- Lack of knowledge about sexuality and/or healthy intimate relationships
- Poverty
- Lack of resources/knowledge of resources
For more information on the above topic, see B1. Sexual Victimization of Persons with Disabilities: Prevalence and Risk Factors in the WV S.A.F.E. Training and Collaboration Toolkit—Serving Sexual Violence Victims with Disabilities.