Sexual coercion among adolescent women seeking abortion in China

Abstract Purpose To probe the backgrounds and reasons of sexual coercion (SC) among the adolescent abortion-seekers in China. Methods In this case-control study, we considered the abortion-seeking women (1137) who reported that they had ever experienced SC as "case group" and we considered the abortion-seeking women (1246) who reported that they had never experienced SC as "control group." We compared the differences in demographic characteristics, some relevant factors (e.g., abusing alcohol, multiple sex partners, etc.). We used OR as a criterion to measure the relative risk (that is, the strength of association between these factors and SC). Results The factors that were more likely to be associated with SC included: poor education (OR, 1.51), beaten by her partner (OR, 3.70), multiple sex partners (OR, 2.93), sex after abusing alcohol (OR, 6.45), selling sex for money (OR, 17.07), having sex for material benefits (OR, 11.68), sex owing to watching pornographic videotape (OR, 3.88), younger age ( 5 years) between male and female partners (OR, 1.34). Conclusions The rate of SC among Chinese adolescent women seeking abortion is rather high, and SC is associated with many factors.