Data and statistics in Sweden

1. Prevalence data and victim surveys
2. Costs of domestic violence
3. Age distribution of domestic violence
4. Number of deaths

1. Prevalence data and victim surveys

The Swedish Crime Survey

One of the most important purposes of crime victim surveys is to supplement the picture that official crime statistics give of crime. In Sweden, the public’s exposure to crime, perceived security and trust in the legal system are monitored through the Swedish Crime Survey (NTU).

The annual Swedish Crime Survey is presented by the National Council for Crime Prevention (Brå). In NTU, 200,000 women and men aged 16–84 are asked about their exposure to crime in the previous calendar year. The data collection is conducted by mail and web surveys.

NTU highlights exposure to a total of thirteen different types of crime. Nine of these relate to crimes against an individual: assault, threats, sexual crimes, robbery, pickpocketing, sales fraud, card/credit fraud, harassment and online abuse. In the survey, the circumstances surrounding the crimes are studied, where the incident took place, whether the exposure was limited to a single incident or repeated, and within certain crime types such as assault and sexual offences, its degree of seriousness. The exposure to crime reported in NTU 2023 refers to exposure in 2022. In NTU 2023, the response rate was approximately 36 percent.

For most types of crimes against persons, men state to a greater extent than women that they have been victims, while women state that they have been subjected to sexual crimes to a significantly greater extent than men.

In NTU 2023, men stated to a higher extent than women did that they had been subjected to abuse (3.3 and 2.3 percent, respectively). Young men aged 16–19 are the group most exposed to abuse (9.7 percent).

Sexual offenses in NTU cover a wide range of offenses – everything from offensive sexual comments to very serious offenses such as rape. Women reported exposure to sexual crimes significantly more often than men (7.8 percent and 1.2 percent, respectively).

The proportion of women who state that they have been victims of sexual crimes is greatest in the age group 20–24 years, where 29.2 percent of women state that they have been victims in 2022.

In the survey, 2.2 percent of the women, and 0.4 percent of the men, state that they were exposed to sexual crimes through coercion and/or sexual crimes through exploitation of a defenceless position in 2022.

Commissioned by the government, the National Council for Crime Prevention has also carried out a national survey of crimes in close relationships.  As part of this, the questionnaire in NTU was expanded in 2013 with a special section on intimate partner violence.

The survey showed that women were more often exposed to more serious violence than men were and were more often in need of care due to serious abuse. Viewed over a lifetime, approximately 25 percent of women and 17 percent of men stated that they at some point had been subjected to crime in a close relationship. In the shorter perspective, in the past year, approximately 7 percent of both women and men stated that they had been subjected to crime in a close relationship. Only a few of the violent crimes, 3.9 percent, had been reported to the police.

Sources: https://bra.se/download/18.126e8d3a18afe99a9721d6c/1696837149983/2023_Nationella_trygghetsundersokningen_2023.pdfhttps://bra.se/download/18.9eaaede145606cc8651ff/1399015861526/2014_8_Brott_i_nara_relationer.pdf

Violence and health in Sweden

In 2012, the National Centre for Knowledge on Men’s Violence Against Women (NCK) conducted a national study in Sweden. 10,000 women and 10,000 men between the ages of 18 and 74 were asked about their exposure to sexual, physical and psychological violence, both in childhood and in adulthood. The study also included questions regarding health and life circumstances.

Some of the results presented in the report:

  • Approximately 20 percent of women and 5 percent of men had, at some time during their life, been subjected to severe sexual violence.
  • 14 percent of women and 5 percent of men had, as adults, been subjected to violence or threats of violence by a current or former partner.
  • 20 percent of women and 8 percent of men had, during some period in their adult life, lived with exposure to repeated and systematic psychological violence exerted by a current or former partner.
  • Those who were exposed to serious violence reported to a significantly higher extent than others symptoms of depression, risky use of alcohol and self-injurious behaviour at some point in their lives.
  • Symptoms of physical ill-health such as headaches, pain in the shoulders or neck, vertigo or recurring intestinal problems are more common in individuals who have been subjected to severe sexual violence.

Source: https://kunskapsbanken.nck.uu.se/nckkb/nck/publik/fil/visa/464/Violence_and_health.pdf

Crimes reported to the police

In the statistics on crimes reported to the police, the gender of the victim and the relationship between the victim and the perpetrator are reported for many of the types of crime that are common in intimate partner violence. Below are the statistics on police-reported crimes involving assault (in 2021)[1] and rape (in 2022).

Source: Official statistics on reported crime, The National Council for Crime Prevention, www.bra.se

[1]. Due to quality issues in the registration of the relationship between the victim and the perpetrator, the National Council for Crime Prevention has estimated the distribution of reported assault crimes per relationship for 2021. This is the estimate shown here.


2. Costs of domestic violence

Men’s violence against women is not only a serious threat to women’s safety and rights. It also entails large financial costs for society, the individual and future generations.

In a report from 2021, the European Institute for Equality, EIGE, has tried to estimate the costs of gender-related violence in the EU in 2019. Gender-related violence refers to violence directed at a person because of the person’s sex. Men can also be subjected to gender-related violence, although the majority of those subjected are women.

EIGE estimates the cost of gender-based violence in the EU to be around €366 billion for 2019.

Of these, approximately 290 billion euros (79 percent) are costs for gender-related violence against women and 76 billion euros (21 percent) are costs for gender-related violence against men.

Based on the calculations for the entire EU, EIGE estimates that the costs of gender-related violence against women in Sweden amount to approximately EUR 6.6 billion (in 2019). The costs of gender-related violence against men are estimated at around 1.8 billion euros.

Partner-related violence against women in Sweden is estimated to cost 3.4 billion euros.

Source: https://eige.europa.eu/sites/default/files/documents/20213229_mh0921238enn_pdf.pdf


3. Age distribution of domestic violence

Based on the survey performed by the National Council for Crime Prevention on crimes in close relationships in 2012, there are also statistics that illustrate exposure to crime in close relationships in different age groups. The diagram below shows how many percent of the population was exposed to one of the types of crime that the survey covered[2]. A similar study will be published in 2024.

Percentage of the population (16-79 years) who were victims of crime in a close relationship in 2012, separate report by gender and age:

Source: https://bra.se/download/18.9eaaede145606cc8651ff/1399015861526/2014_8_Brott_i_nara_relationer.pdf

[2] The crimes/acts requested were violations, attempts to obstruct freedom, threats, harassment, assault, aggravated assault, sexual offense and aggravated sexual offense.


4. Number of deaths

In 2022, ten women in Sweden were killed by perpetrators with whom they had an ongoing or ended relationship. The number of cases was a decrease of five cases compared to the previous year. No cases of fatal violence against men in a couple relationship occurred during the year.

During the years 2017 through 2020, around 15 women a year have been killed by a former or current partner in Sweden. For men, the corresponding figure is just under three cases a year.

Number of cases of fatal violence in a couple relationship 2017−2022:

Percentage of cases of fatal violence that occurred in a couple relationship of the total number of cases of fatal violence against men and women respectively, 2017−2022:

Source: https://bra.se/download/18.6bb714d018722cf91a62572/1680099201251/Statistikrapport_D%C3%B6dligtv%C3%A5ld_2022.pdf