From partners and exes comes much of the physical violence
Istat data show that one in three women have experienced some form of violence in their lifetime, as in the previous survey in 2014
Key points
Numbers that do not change the substance: one in three women has experienced some form of violence in her life and women - when they die - do so predominantly at home and at the hands of men. The bottom line is that violence against women is a structural phenomenon, far from being eradicated from our society, with an important fact concerning the increase in violence among the young and very young, a fact that lends itself to a double reading: either more awareness and thus more emergence or more violence in the new generations. But it is precisely on awareness that it is worth stopping to focus attention, in order to understand where we can start from for that change of pace that we still cannot see and that recent legislative interventions have failed to achieve.
Violence numbers are stable over time
On 21 November, Istat released the first results of the 2025 survey on violence against women, following the 2006 and 2014 surveys (the 2024 feminicide survey is released separately). In the 16-75 age group, 31.9% of women have experienced at least one physical or sexual violence, in 2014 it was 31.5%. "Violence is not on the rise," says Maria Giuseppina Muratore, sociologist, Istat Research Director and expert in gender violence statistics, "the figure is very similar to that of the last survey and, if we look at comparisons with previous surveys and with the numbers of the previous five years, it is stable overall, with an increase in sexual violence and a decrease in physical violence.
Partners, current and ex-partners, are responsible for the highest share of all detected forms of physical violence, with shares above 50% (except for threats), and for some types of sexual violence such as rape (63.8% of rapes are by partners or ex-partners). Only 6.9% of rapes are the work of strangers to the victim.
But women's awareness increases
Analysing the numbers in more depth, non-immediate aspects emerge: 'There is an important datum,' says Muratore, 'the decrease in violence suffered by the current partner. This tells us that women are more aware and able to understand when a relationship is dangerous, when it could become abusive and violent. In other words, awareness mechanisms are triggered that positively affect the ability to prevent: women are more often able to avoid getting into or out of violent and abusive situations'. An aspect that can be seen 'in the increase in the number of calls to 1522, as well as in the doubling, compared to 2014, of the number of those who ask for help at anti-violence centres: this means that it is no longer taboo to talk about violence and ask for help'.
an increase in awareness is also found among the young and very young, who show a greater ability to recognise violent behaviour. "In violence among younger people it emerges that it is mainly episodes from former partners and acquaintances or strangers, not so much from current partners," explains Muratore.
