Acquaintances,Lovers, and Friends: Rape Within Relationships1

The research examines offender behavior in 98 cases of male‐female acquaintance rape reported to the police in the United Kingdom. Each rape is defined according to the predominant style of offender behavior: intimacy, aggression, or criminality. Variations in the style of rape behavior are examined as a function of the prior victim‐offender relationship. The level of relationship intimacy between the victim and offender is defined empirically according to 4 variables: time acquainted, degree of familiarity, previous sexual relationship, and previous cohabitation. The results indicate that criminality style behavior is very infrequent in acquaintance rape. At low levels of relationship intimacy, the rape is more likely to be characterized by intimacy, rather than aggression style behaviors. The implications are discussed.