NCJ Number
213396
Journal
Child Abuse & Neglect Volume: 30 Issue: 2 Dated: February 2006 Pages: 127-143
Date Published
February 2006
Length
17 pages
Annotation
This study investigated the relationships between risk and protective factors and health outcome in a sample of adult female victims of child sexual abuse.
Abstract
Cluster analysis of a sample of 152 adult female child sexual abuse victims found that it was the presence of resources, especially social support that seemed to be more important for health than the amount of risk factors. In addition, self-esteem was closely related to health outcome which displayed the importance of this concept in clinical practice. Prospective studies on the concept of self-esteem, in particular its relationship to social support and health outcome, are necessary to sort out whether it should be viewed as a precursor of resilience or an outcome. An evaluation on the impact of self-help groups is recommended. Using both person- and variable-oriented cluster analyses, this study attempted to identify patterns of combinations of risk and protective factors in a population of female adults reporting child sexual abuse, investigate any relationships between such patterns with health/ill-health measures, and compare these analyses with multiple regression analyses performed on the same set of data. References