To everyone asking why our data is so much higher than all other stats, let me explain:

Good methodology and sophisticated, tested item language always results in more accurate responses.

If you use ambiguous language, you get shit, inaccurate, unreported responses.

Simple.

I am lucky to have been taught by an excellent academic who was an expert to the point of obsession about item construction and language. This skill was passed to me by someone much more knowledgable and I have worked hard to be skilful at creating items and language that works.

Language can ruin a study and you’ll never even know you did it wrong. You’ll think the items were accurate and your data is right, without realising you have made your work inaccessible to huge amounts of people.

We asked women across the UK about specific events in a clear way - instead of asking ‘have you ever been subjected to DV?’ we broke it down into have you ever been punched, kicked, choked, thrown down stairs, pushed over, had item thrown at you, threatened you etc

This means that women who do not realise or are not ready to call it abuse, rape or DV can still take part and answer clearly without us labelling it for them.

This makes the data more accurate because there is no assumption of acknowledgment towards the label

And that’s why it’s so much higher than other studies which simply ask

Have you ever been raped?

Or

Have you ever been victim of DV?

Even those questions have so many linguistic implications and issues - no wonder the data has always been too low

Ever heard the phrase

Garbage in
Garbage out

Well that applies to psychometrics and psychological research.