The Rehabilitation of the Child Sexual Abuse Accommodation Syndrome in Trial Courts in Kentucky

Stewart, William F.; Young, R L

doi:10.1300/j070v01n04_10

Cited by 4 publications

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“…Experts should also be careful in their use of terminology. By analogy, consider the legal battles that arose over prosecutors' attempts to have expert witnesses assign children the diagnosis of "child sexual abuse accommodation syndrome" (CSAAS; Bulkley, 1992;Stewart & Young, 1992;Summit, 1983Summit, , 1992b. CSAAS is not an established psychiatric condition and hence did not meet the Frye standard.…”

Section: Legal Issuesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…CSAAS is not an established psychiatric condition and hence did not meet the Frye standard. Nonetheless, it was apparently not unusual for psychologists admitted as expert witnesses to provide a CSAAS “diagnosis” (Bulkley, 1992; Stewart & Young, 1992). Summit (1992a) stated that, in retrospect, he wishes he had used the term pattern rather than syndrome, because he had intended only to claim that a pattern of allegation and recantation is common in CSA, not that such a pattern verifies the presence of CSA.…”

Section: Memory Recovery Psychotherapy Public Policy and The Lawmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

"Memory work" and recovered memories of childhood sexual abuse: Scientific evidence and public, professional, and personal issues.

Lindsay

Read²

1995

Psychology, Public Policy, and Law

116

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The authors review and critically evaluate scientific evidence regarding recovered memories of childhood sexual abuse and discuss the implications of this evidence for professional psychology, public policy, and the law. The discussion focuses primarily on abuse memories recovered through "memory work" by people who previously believed that they were not sexually abused as children. The authors argue that memory work can yield both veridical memories and illusory memories or false beliefs, and they discuss factors that could be used to weigh the credibility of allegations based on recovered memories. The article offers tentative recommendations regarding public education, training and certification of psychotherapists, guidelines for trauma-oriented psychotherapy, research initiatives, legislative actions, and legal proceedings.The controversy about psychotherapeutic and self-help techniques used to help clients/readers remember hidden histories of childhood sexual abuse (CSA) is the issue at the intersection of psychology, public policy, and the law in the 1990s. 1 Debate centers on the questions of whether many clients are amnesic for histories of CSA and whether "memory work" (techniques used to recover suspected hidden histories of childhood traumas) can lead people who were not sexually abused as children to believe that they were. This topic bristles with complexities and is charged with political tensions and personal emotions. From any perspective, the stakes are high. Victim advocates understandably fear that charges of iatrogenic pseudomemories of CSA threaten therapists and undermine our society's fledgling efforts to

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Section: Legal Issuesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Memory Recovery Psychotherapy Public Policy and The Lawmentioning

confidence: 99%

"Memory work" and recovered memories of childhood sexual abuse: Scientific evidence and public, professional, and personal issues.

Lindsay

Read²

1995

Psychology, Public Policy, and Law

116

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“…Kelley (1976) and Frye 01. United States (1923; see also Stewart 6r Young, 1992).' 'The cases of KeZ&y and Fsye represent tindings that expert opinion based on a scientific technique is inadmissible unless the technique is "generally accepted" as reliable in the relevant scientific community.…”

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confidence: 99%

How valid are child sexual abuse validations?

Fisher¹,

Whiting²

Expert Witnesses in Child Abuse Cases: What Can and Should Be Said in Court.

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In 1984, Ben Bussey was found guilty of child sexual abuse following eyewitness testimony to the alleged offense. At trial, a psychiatrist testifying for the prosecution explained to the Kentucky court that the alleged child victim exhibited symptoms of the child sexual abuse accommodation syndrome (CSAAS;Summit, 1983). The Supreme Court of Kentucky reversed the conviction on the grounds that the lower court had erred by allowing the expert testimony into evidence because CSAAS was not a medically accepted scientific concept (Bussey, Jr. v. Commcvealth, 1985). Th' is case marked the first in a series of child sexual abuse convictions overturned by the Supreme Court of Kentucky on the basis of the failure of CSAAS expert testimony to meet the legal-scientific standards of People 01. Kelley (1976) and Frye 01. United States (1923; see also Stewart 6r Young, 1992).' 'The cases of KeZ&y and Fsye represent tindings that expert opinion based on a scientific technique is inadmissible unless the technique is "generally accepted" as reliable in the relevant scientific community. This criteria does not necessarily apply for expert testimony that does not claim to be an application of scientific techniques ( E l k , 1992). In a more recent case, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the Frye test, and by definition the "general acceptance" criteria, is superseded by adoption of the Federal Rules of Evidence (Daubert u.

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Assessing the accuracy of young children's reports: Lessons from the investigation of child sexual abuse

Poole

Lindsay

1998

Applied and Preventive Psychology

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The Rehabilitation of the Child Sexual Abuse Accommodation Syndrome in Trial Courts in Kentucky

Cited by 4 publications

References 0 publications

"Memory work" and recovered memories of childhood sexual abuse: Scientific evidence and public, professional, and personal issues.

"Memory work" and recovered memories of childhood sexual abuse: Scientific evidence and public, professional, and personal issues.

How valid are child sexual abuse validations?

Assessing the accuracy of young children's reports: Lessons from the investigation of child sexual abuse

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