NCJ Number
101541
Date Published
1986
Length
437 pages
Annotation
Based on face-to-face interviews with a randomly selected sample of 930 women residents of San Francisco, this study discusses the prevalence, characteristics, and psychological victimization effects of incest.
Abstract
During the summer of 1978, preliminary letters were sent to residents selected from 'key addresses' in San Francisco. Followup interviews with the study sample, ranging from 20 minutes to 8 hours, averaged 80 minutes. For study purposes, incestuous abuse is defined as any kind of exploitive sexual contact or attempted contact that occurred between relatives, no matter how distant the relationship, before the victim was 18 years old. Experiences involving desired sexual contact with a relative and with a peer are excluded as nonexploitive. Sixteen percent of the total sample had been sexually abused before age 18, and 5 percent of the sample had been sexually abused by their fathers before this age. Extrapolation indicates that 160,000 women per million in the United States have been incestuously abused before the age of 18, and 45,00 per million have been victimized by their fathers. The abuse cuts across racial, ethnic, and socioecomoic lines. Victim accounts indicate that sexually abused women are more likely than nonabused women to be sexually abused later in life, to be divorced or separated, to have defected from their family religion, and to have feelings of worthlessness and self-blame. All forms of incest have some degree of psychological harm. 63 data tables, 135 references, and subject index.