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Current Psychiatry Reports Nov 2022The present review examines existing childhood sexual abuse prevention programs that are focused on providing services to individuals who are at risk of perpetration. We... (Review)
Review
PURPOSE OF REVIEW
The present review examines existing childhood sexual abuse prevention programs that are focused on providing services to individuals who are at risk of perpetration. We describe several perpetrator-oriented prevention programs with evaluation data as well as avenues for future development and research.
RECENT FINDINGS
Perpetration prevention programs can be divided into anonymous and non-anonymous programs. Anonymous programs include those that provide support via helplines and those that provide self-guided digital interventions. Non-anonymous programs provide traditional psychotherapy. There are several prevention programs with limited evaluation data, but no research to date has aggregated these findings and provided a comprehensive assessment of perpetration prevention. There is insufficient evidence to determine whether perpetration prevention programs are effective. More rigorous evaluations of secondary prevention programs are needed. Despite this, early data suggests that perpetration prevention programs are promising.
Topics: Humans; Sex Offenses
PubMed: 36197629
DOI: 10.1007/s11920-022-01375-8 -
Archives of Sexual Behavior Nov 2022Relative viewing times (VTs)-time required to view and evaluate sexually salient images-discriminate individuals with a sexual interest in children, as indirectly...
Relative viewing times (VTs)-time required to view and evaluate sexually salient images-discriminate individuals with a sexual interest in children, as indirectly indexed by their history of sexual offending against children, from those without such history. In an online sample of 652 fathers, we measured VTs and sexual attraction ratings to child and adult images. We assessed participants' sexual offending history and propensity (self-reported likelihood to have a sexual contact with a child, a non-consensual sexual contact with an adult, and propensity toward father-daughter incest). In contrast with VT studies involving clinical or forensic samples, VTs and attraction ratings failed to discriminate participants with a sexual offending history. VTs successfully distinguished participants with a propensity to sexually offend against children but failed to identify those with a propensity toward incest. Conversely, attraction ratings distinguished participants with a propensity toward incest but failed to identify those with a propensity to sexually offend against children. Correlations between VTs and attraction ratings were small. Results illustrate, for the first time, the distribution of VT measures in community fathers, support the feasibility of online administration of VT tasks to detect propensity to sexually offend against children, and indicate that sexual interest in children and incest propensity are distinct.
Topics: Adult; Child; Humans; Male; Pedophilia; Incest; Sexual Behavior; Surveys and Questionnaires; Fathers; Child Abuse, Sexual
PubMed: 36194341
DOI: 10.1007/s10508-022-02324-5 -
Archives of Sexual Behavior Nov 2022The primary label for people who are sexually attracted to children ("pedophile") is conflated with sexual offending behavior and tainted with stigma. In the present...
The primary label for people who are sexually attracted to children ("pedophile") is conflated with sexual offending behavior and tainted with stigma. In the present pre-registered mixed-method study, we therefore investigated attitudes and preferences regarding "pedophile/hebephile" and other labels among 286 people who report a stronger or equally strong sexual attraction to prepubescent and pubescent children than to adults. Overall, quantitative data showed acceptance of "pedophile/hebephile" as well as a range of alternative labels in a personal (Labeling Oneself) and a professional context (Being Labeled by Others). "Minor-attracted person" and "pedophile/hebephile" received generally higher support than other terms and appeared to be least divisive across three major online fora. Qualitative data revealed four themes: "Contested self-labels," "Person-first language and pathologizing sexuality/identity," "Stigma and shame," and "Reclaiming the pedophile label." Our results allow deeper insight into reasons for adopting certain labels over others, as well as difficulties of finding a non-stigmatizing label. We discuss limitations of the study and practical implications for clinical and research contexts.
Topics: Adult; Child; Humans; Pedophilia; Sexual Behavior; Sex Offenses; Attitude; Gender Identity
PubMed: 36175817
DOI: 10.1007/s10508-022-02331-6 -
Archives of Sexual Behavior Nov 2022There is a fervent social debate ongoing that relates to the ownership of child-like sex dolls. On the one hand, some proponents of dolls suggest that they offer a safe...
There is a fervent social debate ongoing that relates to the ownership of child-like sex dolls. On the one hand, some proponents of dolls suggest that they offer a safe sexual outlet for minor-attracted people (MAPs) and could be used in efforts to prevent the sexual abuse of children. On the other side of the debate, child-like dolls are seen as articles that sexualize children, encourage deviant fantasies, and increase offending risk. To date, no empirical analyses have been undertaken with people who own such dolls. In this paper, we present data from child-like sex doll owners (n = 85) and MAPs who do not own dolls (n = 120) recruited from online forums visited by people who own sex dolls or forums for people with sexual attractions to children. Specifically, we compared their psychological characteristics and proclivities for sexual aggression. Among non-owners, 79.2% of participants declared an interest in owning a sex doll, which is higher than the 20-40% rate reported in adult-attracted samples of non-owners. We found few differences between the groups on most personality variables, with doll owners being less antisocial and anxiously attached than non-owners, but exhibiting more schizotypal traits. Related to offending proclivities, doll ownership was associated with lower levels of sexual preoccupation and self-reported arousal to hypothetical abuse scenarios, but higher levels of sexually objectifying behaviors and anticipated enjoyment of sexual encounters with children. We discuss these data in relation to a functional model of child-like sex doll ownership among MAPs.
Topics: Child; Humans; Child Abuse, Sexual; Ownership; Play and Playthings; Sexual Behavior; Family
PubMed: 36121584
DOI: 10.1007/s10508-022-02422-4 -
Sexual Medicine Reviews Oct 2022The term "paedophilia erotica" was first coined in 1886 by the psychiatrist Krafft-Ebing and it was considered a "psycho-sexual perversion." It was at the beginning of... (Review)
Review
INTRODUCTION
The term "paedophilia erotica" was first coined in 1886 by the psychiatrist Krafft-Ebing and it was considered a "psycho-sexual perversion." It was at the beginning of the twentieth century that the term "pedophilia" was adopted and it started to appear in medical dictionaries. Sexual abuse is legally defined as the engagement in sexual contact with a person below a specified age or who is incapable of giving consent. Both, pedophilia and child sexual abuse (CSA) are worldwide phenomena requiring deep scientific knowledge in order to improve prevention strategies. Individuals' misconceptions of pedophilia and CSA may legitimize sexual violence, which can influence prevention strategies and policies.
OBJECTIVES
This review aimed to summarize existing research to help answer the question: "What are laypeople´s myths regarding pedophilia and CSA?"
METHODS
This systematic review followed the guidelines of Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses to identify as many relevant articles as possible. A literature search was conducted using PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, and EBSCOhost databases for articles published before January 2022. Sixty-one articles were included in the current review.
RESULTS
Overall, findings revealed a significant number of myths regarding pedophilia and CSA, organized into the following categories: (i) blame diffusion, (ii) denial of abusiveness, (iii) restrictive stereotypes, (iv) victim age and consequences, (v) social stigma, (vi) punitive attitudes, and (vii) treatment.
CONCLUSION
Findings suggested that laypeople's perceptions should be taken into account when devising prevention policies. Additionally, perceptions should also be a target of prevention since there is evidence of social stigma and prejudice involving individuals with pedophilia. Such phenomena can contribute to social, emotional, and cognitive problems, among said individuals as well as causing these individuals to exhibit a higher risk for abusive behavior and less help-seeking. Glina F, Barroso R, Cardoso D, et al. Lay People´s Myths Regarding Pedophilia and Child Sexual Abuse: A Systematic Review. Sex Med Rev 2022;10:596-619.
Topics: Attitude; Child; Child Abuse, Sexual; Humans; Paraphilic Disorders; Pedophilia; Sexual Behavior
PubMed: 36030179
DOI: 10.1016/j.sxmr.2022.06.010 -
International Journal of Environmental... Jul 2022The public stigma associated with pedophilia, the sexual attraction to prepubescent children, is tremendous. Previous research indicates that undifferentiated media...
The public stigma associated with pedophilia, the sexual attraction to prepubescent children, is tremendous. Previous research indicates that undifferentiated media coverage plays an essential role in perpetuating the public stigma by falsely equating pedophilia and child sexual abuse (CSA) and thus may stop persons suffering from a pedophilic disorder from seeking professional help. Until now, a comprehensive examination of positive as well as negative media effects on affected individuals is missing. Therefore, the present study explores if and how media coverage impacts the lives of help-seeking persons with pedophilia by conducting four qualitative focus group discussions with a clinical sample (N = 20) from the German Prevention Network "Kein Täter werden". Present results demonstrate that media coverage of pedophilia was perceived as mostly undifferentiated, even though participants observed an increase in fact-based reporting over the years. Moreover, it seems that media coverage has strong emotional and behavioral consequences for patients (e.g., negative reporting reduced self-esteem). In sum, our results highlight that differentiated media coverage could play a key role in supporting help-seeking persons with pedophilic disorder, while the impact of undifferentiated media coverage appears to be mostly negative. Therefore, our results point to the need to reframe pedophilia using differentiated media coverage to help affected persons receive treatment efficiently and thereby prevent CSA.
Topics: Child; Child Abuse, Sexual; Focus Groups; Germany; Humans; Pedophilia; Social Stigma
PubMed: 35954714
DOI: 10.3390/ijerph19159356 -
Archives of Sexual Behavior Nov 2022The Screening Scale of Pedophilic Crime Scene Behavior (SSPC) is a seven-item structured rating scale assessing pedophilic sexual arousal. In the current study, we...
The Screening Scale of Pedophilic Crime Scene Behavior (SSPC) is a seven-item structured rating scale assessing pedophilic sexual arousal. In the current study, we cross-validated the scale's convergent validity using multiple measures of sexual interest in children (clinical diagnosis of pedophilia, the high fixation/low social competence type of the MTC:CM4, and phallometric assessment of sexual interests toward children) in two independent samples (USA and Canada). In both samples and in relation to all three criteria, the SSPC showed acceptable (phallometry) to excellent (clinical assessment) diagnostic accuracy. Furthermore, the SSPC showed incremental validity in relation to the Screening Scale for Pedophilic Interest and at times outperformed it in convergent validity analyses. The current study also provides psychometric information that can help users choose an appropriate SSPC cutoff score.
Topics: Child; Humans; Pedophilia; Child Abuse, Sexual; Sexual Behavior; Crime; Psychometrics
PubMed: 35896938
DOI: 10.1007/s10508-022-02354-z -
Sexual Abuse : a Journal of Research... Jun 2023Little is known about distinct factors linked with acting on paraphilic interests or refraining from engaging in paraphilic behaviors. Participants from Canada and the...
Little is known about distinct factors linked with acting on paraphilic interests or refraining from engaging in paraphilic behaviors. Participants from Canada and the United States ( = 744), aged 19-42 years ( = 29.2; = 3.18), were recruited through Amazon's Mechanical Turk. Participants completed questionnaires about their paraphilic interests and behaviors, as well as potential key factors linked to behavioral engagement (i.e., perceptions of consent, sexual excitation/inhibition, impulsivity, moral disengagement, empathy). Results indicated that higher moral disengagement and impulsivity, lower sexual control (i.e., high sexual excitation, low sexual inhibition), and maladaptive understandings of consent were best able to differentiate individuals who reported highly stigmatized (e.g., hebephilia, pedophilia, coprophilia) or Bondage and Dicipline, Dominance and Submission, Sadism and Masochism(BDSM)/Fetish paraphilic interests and engagement in the paraphilic behaviours associated with these interests relative to individuals who did not report such paraphilic interests or behaviors. Moreover, higher moral disengagement, impulsivity, and maladaptive perceptions of consent were best able to differentiate non-consensual paraphilic interests and behaviours (e.g., voyeurism, exhibitionism) compared to individuals who did not report these paraphilic interests or behaviours. These results provide future directions for the exploration of mechanisms that may contribute to engagement in paraphilic behaviors and may be targets for intervention aimed at preventing engagement in potentially harmful paraphilias.
Topics: Humans; Sexual Behavior; Paraphilic Disorders; Sadism; Masochism; Pedophilia
PubMed: 35699951
DOI: 10.1177/10790632221108949 -
Neuropsychologia Aug 2022The ability to inhibit behavior is thought to be an import skill for avoiding criminal conduct, especially when combined with personal predispositions or criminogenic...
The ability to inhibit behavior is thought to be an import skill for avoiding criminal conduct, especially when combined with personal predispositions or criminogenic needs such as a pedophilic preference disorder. While previous research emphasized the relationship between impulsivity and child sexual offending, not pedophilia per se, studies on the underlying neurobiological mechanisms in subdomains of impulsivity remained scarce. Here, we focused on interference inhibition and examined event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data of three groups of men performing a color-word Stroop task: (1) pedophiles with a history of CSO (P+CSO, n = 11), (2) pedophiles without a history of CSO (P-CSO, n = 8) and (3) non-pedophilic, non-offending healthy controls (HC, n = 10). On the behavioral level, P+CSO revealed increased Stroop interference as compared to P-CSO and HC. Moreover, increased Stroop interference in P+CSO was accompanied by enhanced conflict-related activity in left superior parietal cortex and precentral gyrus as compared to P-CSO. Albeit behavioral analyses of error and post-error processing revealed no significant between-group differences, P-CSO showed increased post-error-related activity in left posterior cingulate, precuneus and middle temporal gyrus as compared to P+CSO. Our preliminary data highlight inhibition deficits in offending as compared to non-offending pedophiles or healthy men and suggest that functional alterations in attention reallocation and impulse suppression/control may moderate the risk for committing CSO in men suffering from pedophilia.
Topics: Child; Child Abuse, Sexual; Humans; Inhibition, Psychological; Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Male; Pedophilia; Sexual Behavior
PubMed: 35697089
DOI: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2022.108301 -
Psychiatria Polska Feb 2022The main objective of the study was not only to show the scale of child sexual abuse by clergy itself, but rather presentation of the manner in which perpetrators act...
OBJECTIVES
The main objective of the study was not only to show the scale of child sexual abuse by clergy itself, but rather presentation of the manner in which perpetrators act and what their motivations are.
METHODS
It involved aqualitative and quantitative analysis of documentation gathered by the Foundation dedicated to supporting victims of sexual abuse by clergy. For the purpose of the study the authors prepared a survey which included information pertaining to the circumstances of the abuse, the abuser, the aggrieved person, as well as legal and non-legal consequences (sanctions). Finally, information pertaining to 80 criminal cases from 2001-2019 in which the perpetrator (member of the clergy) was sentenced by afinal and binding judgment was gathered.
RESULTS
On the basis of analysis of the empirical material, various models of the perpetrators' modi operandi have been developed, which included also the methods of selecting the victims or types of actions taken to keep the abuse of minors secret. As part of the analyzes, the characteristics of the aggrieved persons were also developed, and the characteristics specific to various models of clergy behavior were distinguished.
CONCLUSIONS
Attention should be drawn to the fact that in many of the cases the clergy perpetrated child sexual abuse consisted in direct physical violence, as well as regular sexual intercourse. Also, not all perpetrators were required to undergo appropriate diagnostic tests in order to verify whether they have a disorder of sexual preference in the form of pedophilia. In the studied group of cases, in every third case the perpetrator, after disclosure of the acts, was transferred to another parish, where other similar acts took place.
Topics: Catholicism; Child; Child Abuse, Sexual; Clergy; Crime Victims; Humans; Minors; Pedophilia
PubMed: 35569154
DOI: 10.12740/PP/OnlineFirst/123883