Preventing Child Sexual Abuse: Evidence, theory, policy & practice

1. Preventing Child Sexual Abuse:Evidence, theory, policy & practice Stephen Smallbone School of Criminology & Criminal Justice Griffith University, Australia

2. Seminar Outline • Evidence, theory, policy and practice • Empirical dimensions of CSA • An integrated theory • Prevention models • Knowledge-based, prevention-centred policy and practice • Discussion

3. Empirical dimensions • CSA offenders almost always male • No other identifying characteristic as consistently observed as male gender • Two main risk periods for the onset of CSA offending • adolescence • novelty & urgency of sexual drive; low stake in social conformity; low self-control; ready access to younger children • early middle-age • Have own children, or friends who have children; child-related employment; relationship instability?

4. Empirical dimensions • CSA offenders likely to know victim • Often for considerable period of time before first abuse incident • Often a parental or quasi-parental relationship • Involves authority and guardianship • CSA often occurs in the context of either aggression or (paradoxically) nurturance • Abuse-related motivations likely to be very different for potential, novice, and persistent offenders

5. Empirical dimensions • Victim characteristics • Risk of victimisation varies by age, gender and circumstances • Girls approx twice as likely to be victims • Girls more at risk of sustained abuse, at younger age, in familial settings • Boys more at risk of short-term abuse, at older age, in nonfamilial settings • Risks for CSA similar to those for other kinds of maltreatment • General individual and family vulnerabilities • More adverse outcomes associated with • Abuse by father/father figure • Longer duration • Force or violence • Lack of support, esp following disclosure

6. Empirical dimensions Abuse settings • Ordinary settings where adults (or adolescents) and children involved together in routine activities • Domestic settings (most common) • Organisational settings (common) • Public settings (uncommon) • The social ecology of sexual abuse • Risk & protective factors located at multiple levels of the offender’s and victim’s social ecologies • Individual; family; peers; school/workplace; neighbourhood; socio-cultural environment • Capable guardians; handlers; place managers

7. An integrated theory Biological foundations • Behavioural flexibility in the service of biological goals • Potential for both prosocial and antisocial behaviour • Individual survival • attachment (care-seeking) system • Reproduction • sexual system • nurturing (care-taking) system • Male sexuality associated with both aggression and nurturance • Attachment, nurturing & sexual systems biologically related • Male preference for smaller, younger sexual partners • For males, nurturing system more susceptible to competing motivations

8. An integrated theory Developmental influences • Positive social cognitive development generally restrains, but does not eliminate, capacity for antisocial conduct • Mechanisms of self-restraint • Empathy & perspective taking; emotional self-regulation; personal & social attachments • Control theory • offenders don’t learn to commit sexual offences, they fail to learn not to • offending constrained by self-control; informal social controls; formal social controls

9. An integrated theory Ecological influences • Proximal systems (family/peers) exert more direct influence than distal systems (neighbourhood/socio-cultural environment) • Cultural/subcultural norms & values • Routine activities of offenders & victims • Formal & informal systems for effective child protection Situational influences • Specific situational elements that comprise the immediate pre-offence and offence setting • Situations as opportunity • Situations evoke offence-related motivations • Cues; temptations; perceived provocations; social pressures; permissibility

10. Prevention models • Public Health model • Primary (universal) prevention • Preventing potential victims from ever being abused; preventing potential offenders from ever offending • Secondary prevention • Focuses on ‘at risk’ people, groups and places • Tertiary prevention • Preventing repeat / re-victimisation; preventing recidivism

11. Prevention models • Tonry & Farrington’s (1995) Crime Prevention Model • Developmental crime prevention • Aims to reduce number of potential offenders by targeting developmental risk and protective factors • Situational crime prevention • Aims to reduce criminogenic features of potential abuse settings • Community development approaches • Mobilising communities to focus on specific local crime problems • Criminal Justice interventions • Detection & investigation; general and specific deterrence; general and selective incapacitation; offender rehabilitation

12. Prevention models • Proposed prevention model • Three levels of prevention • Primary, secondary and tertiary • Four essential targets • Offenders, victims, situations, communities • Thus, 12 points of focus (3 levels x 4 targets)

13. Twelve points of focus for preventing CSA

14. Policy & practice • Shift toward prevention-centred policy and practice required • “Prevention Science” • Broad definition of ‘evidence-based’ policy/practice • Concerned with much more than whether a specific technique or program has been shown to ‘work’ • Should draw from the widest possible knowledge-base • Knowledge as empirical evidence + coherent/testable theory • e.g. developmental, social, clinical psychology developmental & environmental criminology evolutionary, social ecology & developmental theories • Can draw from wide repertoire of proven or promising interventions

15. Discussion points • Is it helpful to think about child sexual abuse as a wholly unique and distinct phenomenon, requiring its own unique explanations and its own unique solutions? • What can we learn from prevention efforts in related fields? • What are the barriers to translating knowledge and expertise to knowledge-based policy and practice?