Sexual Assault Trauma

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Despite the feelings of isolation associated, sexual assault is not an isolated experience. Often following an assault survivors and their communities endure lasting and harmful consequences. For those affected by sexual assault, they can experience short and long-term negative psychological, emotional, physical effects as well as increase health risk behaviors. Some of the documented psychological consequences experiences by survivors of sexual assault include: depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder, low self-esteem, shame, fear, and denial (Basile & Smith (2011); Littleton, Grills-Taquechel, Axsom (2009) Campbell, Dworkin, Cabral (2009); Goodman, Koss, Russo (1993); Coker, Hopenhayn, DeSimone, Bush, & Crofford (2009)). Sexual violence and/or trauma related can manifest into physical pain causing chronic pain, migraines, gastrointestinal disorders, sexually transmitted diseases, and cervical cancer (Chen, Murad, Paras, Cobenson, Sattler, Goranson, Zirahzadeh (2010);Tomasula, Anderson, Littleton, Riley-Tillman (2012); Yuan, Koss, Stone (2006);Zinzow, Resnick, McCauley, Amstadter, Ruggiero, Kilpatrick (2010)).
Despite the severity of this offence, sexual assault and rape remain as the most under reported crimes in the world (cite). In reducing sexual assault cases it
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The purpose of this study was to understand what is preventing survivors from reporting. The Illinois rape myth acceptance scale- short form was administered and they found the level of endorsement of rape myths to be relatively low at with the mean score of 30.54 for a scoring range of 17-119 among participants. Participants reported that it was their insecurity associated with their ability to recognize if a crime had been committed that prevented them from reporting because they did not fit the "classic rape"