Almost a third of the victims of sexual assaults are men, according to the latest Garda statistics.
They also show that one in four victims of assault causing harm is a woman.
These details are made available by the new PULSE computer analysis of the crime figures, which this year are applied to the serious or "headline" crime.
They also give a detailed breakdown of the types of sexual assault, revealing that there were 10 assaults on mentally impaired persons and 78 cases of unlawful carnal knowledge of a female.
The figures also show a relative decrease in the proportion of female murder victims. They formed 45 per cent of the murders recorded in 1996 but this has been falling steadily as a proportion, with only 25 per cent of the victims in 2001 being women. However, this took place within an overall context of an increase in the total number of murders.
There was a drop in the number of children murdered in 2001. The murder of children under 10 had increased from zero in 1999 to eight in 2000, but dropped slightly to six last year. However, 29 per cent of all murder victims were under 20.
However, the report warns that a cautious approach must be exercised when analysing age and gender in the murder figures because of the small numbers involved.
The statistics also give a regional breakdown of crime. Predictably, Dublin tends to have more than its share under most headings but this is most marked with aggravated burglaries, where the capital accounts for 72 per cent of the total.
The figures show that the numbers convicted of drink-driving offences continues to rise, with 6,790 such convictions last year, up from 6,593 the previous year. Of these, 93 per cent were male. The total number of arrests for drink-driving was 12,841, up from 10,433 in 2000.
However, the total number of road traffic offences was down by 26 per cent. The largest drop was in the Dublin region, where proceedings fell by 39 per cent.
Domestic violence incidents also decreased in 2001, when they fell by 8 per cent on the previous year. There was a total of 9,983 incidents.
While the majority of complainants were female, 13 per cent were male. Equally, the figures show that 11 per cent of the offenders in these incidents were female.