What are the odds of experiencing sexual harassment?
Evidence quality 4.63/5
Eight-dimension review score against the quality rubric . Each dimension scored 1–5.
- D1 Source grounding
- 5/5
- D2 Source authority
- 5/5
- D3 Arithmetic
- 4/5
- D4 Uncertainty
- 4/5
- D5 Scope
- 4/5
- D6 Prose
- 5/5
- D7 Perception honesty
- 5/5
- D8 Caveat completeness
- 5/5
Lifetime probability · lifetime, US adult
1 in 1.6
62% lifetime chance
Most people underestimate this.
range 1 in 2.2 to 1 in 1.4
● your factors — click this risk ▾ to reveal
≈ As likely as
Perceived
Gallup's 2025 crime-worry poll finds 21% of US adults worry frequently or occasionally about being sexually assaulted — a figure that masks a stark gender split: 38% of women versus 4% of men. Among women under 50, the figure rises to about 42%. Yet the question asks about assault, not the broader category of harassment, so the worry metric likely understates concern about the wider phenomenon captured by prevalence surveys.
Rough estimate: ~1 in 3 women perceive it as likely for themselves
Source: Gallup (2025) — Crime in U.S. Seen as Less Serious for Second Straight Year
Actual
81% of women and 43% of men report some form in their lifetime
US adults (SSH/GfK nationally representative survey, 2018)
Show derivation
The Stop Street Harassment / GfK 2018 nationally representative survey of 2,000 US adults found 81% of women and 43% of men experienced some form of sexual harassment or assault in their lifetime. Using Census sex distribution (~51% female, ~49% male): (0.81 × 0.51) + (0.43 × 0.49) ≈ 0.413 + 0.211 ≈ 0.62. This is a population-weighted lifetime prevalence, not a per-year rate compounded forward. The CDC's NISVS 2023/2024 data reports lower figures for specific subcategories (e.g., 30.4% of women for verbal workplace harassment), reflecting narrower definitions. The SSH figure uses the broadest definition — verbal harassment, unwanted touching, cyber harassment, and assault combined — and is the most-cited headline number. The 0.62 population-average is conservative in the sense that it weights equally across sexes; the lived experience is dramatically skewed.
Caveats: This entry uses the broadest available definition of sexual harassment — verbal …
This entry uses the broadest available definition of sexual harassment — verbal harassment, unwanted touching, cyber harassment, being followed, and assault combined. Narrower definitions (e.g., CDC NISVS workplace verbal harassment at 30% for women) yield substantially lower figures. The SSH survey was conducted online via GfK's probability-based panel, which may produce higher disclosure rates than telephone surveys due to reduced social desirability bias. The 81% figure for women is a lifetime cumulative prevalence, not an annual rate, and includes experiences ranging from a single instance of street catcalling to repeated assault. The gender disparity is among the largest on this site: women's lifetime prevalence is nearly double that of men. The population- weighted 62% figure is arithmetically correct but obscures the profoundly different lived experiences of women and men.
Risks at similar odds
Other risks with roughly the same likelihood — useful for calibration.
Recently viewed on this device
Stored locally — clear anytime.
Pick challenger
About three in five US adults — roughly 62% when weighted across sexes — report experiencing some form of sexual harassment or assault in their lifetime, according to a 2018 nationally representative survey of 2,000 people conducted by GfK for Stop Street Harassment. The gender gap is enormous: 81% of women versus 43% of men. That population-average figure is comparable to the lifetime odds of identity theft and an order of magnitude more common than being the victim of a home burglary.
The gap between “worry” and “experience” runs in the opposite direction from most entries on this site. Only 21% of Americans tell Gallup they worry about sexual assault, yet a clear majority have experienced some form of harassment by the time the survey reaches them. Part of the explanation is definitional: people mentally anchor on violent assault when asked about worry, while prevalence surveys cast a wider net that includes verbal harassment and unwanted touching. Part is normalization — experiences common enough to be expected stop registering as noteworthy threats. The CDC’s NISVS 2023/2024 data, using a narrower definition limited to workplace verbal harassment, still finds 30% of women affected, confirming that even the more conservative measurement produces a large number.
The headline figure of 62% is a blunt instrument. It aggregates a single catcall on a sidewalk with years of workplace harassment and physical assault, weighting each the same. It also masks variation by age, sexual orientation, and race: CDC data consistently shows elevated rates among younger women, LGBTQ+ individuals, and certain racial/ethnic groups. Anyone using this number should specify what it includes and acknowledge that the severity distribution underneath it is extraordinarily wide.
Claim ledger
Every number below is what each source reported, with the verbatim quote we relied on and how we arrived at our figure. Click any link to verify directly.
-
[1] Stop Street Harassment / GfK — 2018 Study on Sexual Harassment and Assault
2018 Study on Sexual Harassment and Assault- Statistic
81% of women and 43% of men experienced some form of sexual harassment and/or assault in their lifetime- Excerpt
“"Nationwide, 81 percent of women and 43 percent of men reported experiencing some form of sexual harassment and/or assault in their lifetime. Verbal sexual harassment was the most common form (77% of women and 34% of men). An alarming 51% of women and 17% of men said they were touched or groped in an unwelcome way." ”
- Source data from
- 2018-02-21
- Accessed
- 2026-04-18 · archived copy
- Calculation
- SSH commissioned a 2,000-person nationally representative survey conducted by GfK (now Ipsos). The 81% (women) and 43% (men) figures cover all forms of sexual harassment and assault combined: verbal harassment, unwanted touching/groping, cyber harassment, being followed, genital flashing, and sexual assault. Population-weighted average: (0.81 × 0.51) + (0.43 × 0.49) ≈ 0.62. Pro bono data analysis by UC San Diego Center on Gender Equity and Health.
-
[2] CDC, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control — National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey: 2023/2024 Sexual Violence Data Brief
National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey: 2023/2024 Sexual Violence Data Brief- Statistic
30.4% of women experienced verbal sexual harassment in the workplace; 11.3% of men; 29.5% of women in public places- Excerpt
“"Approximately 1 in 3 women in the U.S. experienced verbal sexual harassment in the workplace (30.4%) or public place (29.5%), and more than 1 in 4 women experienced technology-facilitated sexual violence in their lifetimes (28.2%). One in 9 men (11.3%) experienced verbal sexual harassment in the workplace." ”
- Source data from
- 2025-12-01
- Accessed
- 2026-04-18 · archived copy
- Calculation
- CDC NISVS 2023/2024 uses narrower subcategories than the SSH survey. The workplace verbal harassment figure (30.4% women) is not directly comparable to the SSH 81% because SSH aggregates all forms and all settings. The NISVS figure serves as a conservative lower bound for workplace-specific verbal harassment and confirms the order of magnitude. Nearly half of women experienced contact sexual violence in their lifetimes per NISVS.
- Independence
- NISVS is a CDC random-digit-dial telephone survey, methodologically independent of the SSH/GfK online panel survey. The two use different sampling frames, question wording, and definitions of harassment.
-
[3] Gallup — Crime in U.S. Seen as Less Serious for Second Straight Year
Crime in U.S. Seen as Less Serious for Second Straight YearSee all 6 Likelier entries citing this source →
- Statistic
21% of US adults worry frequently or occasionally about being sexually assaulted (2025); 38% of women vs 4% of men- Excerpt
“"Fewer Americans say they worry about crimes, such as having a car stolen (39%) or their home burglarized (34%), being a victim of a hate crime (30%), or getting mugged (29%), attacked while driving (27%), murdered (22%) or sexually assaulted (21%)." ”
- Source data from
- 2025-10-30
- Accessed
- 2026-04-18 · archived copy
- Calculation
- Used for perceived-risk axis only. The 21% figure is the population-level share reporting frequent-or-occasional worry about sexual assault. Women are 34 percentage points more likely to worry than men (38% vs 4%). This is worry about assault specifically, not the broader harassment category.
- Independence
- Gallup telephone survey, independent of both SSH/GfK and CDC NISVS. Measures worry, not prevalence.