NCJ Number
101990
Date Published
1986
Length
24 pages
Annotation
Research on child sexual abusers should attempt to remedy the conceptual and methodological problems characterizing such research to date.
Abstract
Research on child molesters has erred in tending to explain all child molesting with single-factor theories, for example, that child sexual abuse derives from abusers having been molested as children. Future research should use a four-factor model that examines abusers' emotional congruence with children, their sexual arousal by children, their blocked social and sexual relationships with adults, and their failure to be deterred by normative prohibitions against adult-child sexual relationships. Also, research on child molesters has been remiss in not examining why child sexual abusers are predominantly male. Gender as a variable apparently interacts with virtually every other variable proposed in current theories. Also little attention has been given to sex offender recidivism, and studies that have been conducted have not clearly distinguished between child molesters and other types of sex offenders, nor followed up each molester for a fixed time period. They have not thoroughly examined whether treatment reduces recidivism. Another major research flaw is the focus on sex offenders recruited in the criminal justice system, which casts doubt on the generality of the findings, since many child sexual abusers are not detected.