*The following is a letter that Dr. Mary Koss and Louise Fitzgerald wrote
to The New York Times in response to an article by Katie Roiphe. The letter
was provided by Ethel Tobach (email: ettgc@cunyvm) with permission 
from Mary Koss.


     The New York Times
     by Fax:  212 556 3690                                  June 14

     To the Editor:

     Katie Roiphe's article, "Rape Hype Betrays Feminism" begins by 
questioning the frequently replicated statistic that 1 in 4 college women
has been the victim of rape or attempted rape. She cites the failure
of her "intricate gossip networks" to uncover more than one or two
"shadowy instances" of rape.  She also wonders, "If 25% of my women
friends were really being raped--wouldn't I know it?"  Given Ms.
Roiphe's views on the subject of rape, it is perhaps not surprising
that so few individuals choose to confide in her.  However, her personal
experience hardly constitutes a substitute for the scientific evidence
she blithely discards.  As the authors of two extensive scientific
studies of respectively, sexual assault and sexual harrasment on
university campuses, we would like to correct some of her distortions.

To begin, the author trivializes research on rape prevalence by
characterizing the data in a single sentence focused on a lone data
source. The numbers she dismisses are only one entry in the extensive
literature on rape prevalence.  Substantially similar conclusions are
reached in no less than 15 published studies on college students, 7
studies of representative samples of community-based women, and a recent 
report based on a national sample of over 4,000 women (National
Victims Center, April, 1992).  The study by Koss that Ms. Roiphe
questions was federally-funded by the National Institute of Mental
Health and published inrigorously peer-reviewed scholarly journals.
In addition, not a single study of rape rates among college students,
whether in this country or abroad, has failed to replicate the findings.

Second, Ms. Roiphe is extremely careless in presentation of numbers.
A figure (25%) that includes rapes and attempted rape in the first
sentence (as well as in published research reports) has been inflated
to refer to completed rapes by the time we reach the fifth sentence.
Now who is "hyping" the figures?  Ms. Roiphe is guilty, both here and
throughout her article, of the same sort of over-generalization and
hysteria of which she accuses those she labels derisively as 
"rape-crisis feminists."

Third, although educational materials exist that promote broad 
interpretations of the term "rape," Roiphe errs (and was given 
documentation of her error pre-publication) in the assumption that such
definitions undergird the empirical data base.  After being presented
with the scholarly publication specifying that the Koss findings were
based on a legal definition of rape (Ohio Revised Code, Suppl. 2907.
01A, 2907.02[l980]), she persists in asserting that the research reflects 
a so-called radical rape-crisis center feminist approach
to rape.  In spite of possessing the information, no attempt at
clarification appeared in the article.  We can only conclude that
having formed her opinion, she did not wish to be confused by the
data.

Fourth, the article goes beyond its faulty critique of rape research
to dismiss the entire problem of sexual harasment as oversensitivity
to "a professor's dirty jokes," and "sexual innuendo."  Ms. Roiphe is
unfamiliar with research on this topic that indicates that literally
thousands of women students are subjected by their professors or
instructors to harassing behaviors ranging from verbal insults to
rape.

Finally, we are distressed that a publication as distinguished as
the New York Times would lend its prestige to an effort so uninformed, 
so flawed and so destructive.  At the risk of being accused of disciplinary 
chauvinism, we submit that Ms. Roiphe, however
gifted she may be at English literature, is neither qualified nor
apparently motivated to provide a competent critique of the scientific 
literature.  Our dismay is compounded by your apparent disinterest 
in the accuracy of the article.  When contacted by the New York
Times fact-checker, Professor Koss requested to be interviewed for
the article since her research forms its introductory frame.  Although 
promised a call from the editor, she was never contacted.  Even
Janet Malcolm interviewed her sources before constructing her
articles.

               Sincerely, 


			  Mary P. Koss, Ph. D.
                          University of Arizona
                          2223 E. Speedway Blvd.
                          Tucson, Ariz 85719

                          Louise F. Fitzgerald
                          University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
                          210 Education Bldg.
                          1310 S. Sixth St.
                          Champaign, IL 61820-6990