Sexual Abuse of Children

Abstract

An epidemiologic study of sexual abuse of children was made by reviewing Minneapolis Police Department records. Children were involved in 33% of all cases reported. Eighty-five percent of cases involved exposure or indecent liberties. Half of the cases occurred in the summer; half of the cases occurred from 2 to 6 PM. The mean age of victims was 10.7 years, and 88% were girls. All reported offenders were men; their "mean estimated age" was 28 years. The method of study did not allow determination of social relationships between victims and the offenders. Little information regarding the magnitude of the problems of medical, psychological, and social sequelae of sexual abuse of children is available in the literature.

Does Victim Age Differentiate Between Perpetrators of Sexual Child Abuse? A Study of Mental Health, Psychosocial Circumstances, and Crimes

“…Studies in CSA offenders have described high frequencies of mood disorders, anxiety, and substance abuse (Raymond, Coleman, Ohlerking, Christenson, & Miner, 1999), coping difficulties (Marshall, Marshall, Sachdev, & Kruger, 2003), and low self-esteem (Fisher, Beech, & Browne, 1999;Marshall et al, 2003). Although the most common CSA victims are girls around the age of 10 years (Cupoli & Sewell, 1988;Finkelhor, 1994;Jaffe, Dynneson, & ten Bensel, 1975;Marshall, Barbaree, & Christophe, 1986), sexual violation of even younger children appears to be a considerable problem of largely unknown dimensions (Cupoli & Sewell, 1988;Dube & Hebert, 1988;Schetky, 1991). Most CSA crimes brought to court involve severe forms of intrusion, such as oral, anal, and vaginal penetration (Cross, Whitcomb, & De Vos, 1995).…”

Attempted Drowning as a Form of Non-Accidental Injury

“…With increasing awareness of the prevalence of non-accidental injury, new facets of child abuse are constantly being added to the longrecognised syndrome of battered children. To the spectrum of acute physical violence (Kempe et al, 1962;Harcourt and Hopkins, 1971;Birrell and Birrell, 1968;Wurfel and Maxwell, 1965), thermal injury (Gil, 1970;Cameron and Rae, 1975;Friedman and Morse, 1974;Smith and Hanson, 1974), sexual abuse (McAnarney, 1975;Jaffe et al, 1975), deprivation (Pemberton and Benady, 1973;Newberger and Hyde, 1975) and poisoning (Friedman and Morse, 1974;Lansky, 1974;and Rodgers et al, 1976), has been added the subacute concomitants of dermatitis, infection and anaemia (Cameron and Rae, 1975;Akbarnia et al, 1974). Nutritional neglect, occasionally with hypovitaminosis, is also part of the syndrome (Tizard, 1975;Bialestock, 1966;Fontana et aE., 1963).…”

Trauma exposure and diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (Fifth Edition) posttraumatic stress disorder among Danish adults: Implications of narrow and broad operationalizations of criterion A.

“…This disorder maintained the relationship between an external stressor and the onset of psychiatric morbidity. However, there was a remarkable lack of distinction between negative life events and traumatic life events (examples provided in DSM-II included unwanted pregnancy, war, and receiving a death sentence), especially considering a hitherto unprecedented prevalence of large-scale disasters (bombing of Hiroshima 1945, numerous hurricanes, floods, and blizzards in United States) and war (including Second World War [1939–1945], the Korean war [1950–1953], and the Vietnam war [1955–1975]), in addition to a dawning realization of the prevalence and severity of child abuse (Jaffe et al, 1975; Kempe et al, 1962; Wilson, 1994).…”