NCJ Number
204330
Journal
Child Abuse & Neglect Volume: 25 Issue: 3 Dated: March 2001 Pages: 335-346
Date Published
March 2001
Length
12 pages
Annotation
This article discusses whether early sexual abuse and adult risky sexual behaviors among community-recruited women are related.
Abstract
The study’s aim was to determine whether sexual abuse involving penetration that occurred in childhood only, adolescence only, or both childhood and adolescence differently affected whether community-recruited women had ever traded sex for money or drugs, the number of recent sex partners, and the number of times they had engaged in recent unprotected sex. Another aim of this study was to assess the mediating effects of adulthood rape, recent drug use, and recent sex with an injection drug user on these three HIV-risky sexual behaviors. Over 1,400 women from 3 sites in the United States were interviewed. Regression analysis indicated a significant relationship between early sexual abuse and adult risky behaviors; rape in adulthood mediated this relationship for all three HIV-risky behaviors. Abuse that occurred in childhood only and abuse that occurred in both childhood and adolescence had a stronger impact on later risky behaviors than did abuse that occurred in adolescence only. Because childhood constitutes a critical period in an individual’s sexual, social, and personal development, sexual abuse precipitated during this time may distort women’s constructions of sex and sexuality. As a result of these disruptions, women may engage in HIV-risky sexual behaviors to a greater extent than women abused in adolescence. Rape in adulthood appears to intensify the effects of early sexual abuse, increasing abused women’s involvement in risky behaviors. In order to help these women adopt safer sex practices, treatment should connect their experiences during development to their current behaviors. 4 tables, 18 references