“They conceptualized it as part of their overall health experiences.”Īndrea DeMaria, an assistant professor of public health at Purdue University, has conducted surveys and in-depth interviews with women across the United States and internationally about their reproductive health experiences. “It wasn’t a question that we were actually asking them about, so all of these women had self-disclosed that they had experienced sexual violence of some nature as part of the overarching conversations about their reproductive and women’s health,” said Meier, the corresponding author of the paper. The respondents were part of a larger study of the reproductive health experiences of 70 women, ranging from 19 to 78 years old and living in South Carolina. Meier’s research focuses on women’s decision making about reproductive health care.Īn analysis of 16 in-depth interviews with women who had experienced rape, molestation, coercion or other forms of sexual violence, published in the Journal of Interpersonal Violence, shows that communication was key to coping with and making sense of their experiences, despite the women facing a “stigma of silence” in their families and communities. “Health care providers can be that pillar for sexual violence survivors to share those experiences and get support or wraparound care, even in situations where they don’t have community or family support,” said Stephanie Meier, a doctoral student in the College of Health and Human Sciences at Purdue University.
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