Sexual Victimization of Children and Adolescents: An Overview
Sexual Victimization of Children and Adolescents: An Overview
Other behavior
Sexualized changes may be
behaviors are nonspecific
most concerning • Sleep, appetite,
but must be toileting
distinguished • Fears, sadness
from normal • Aggressive or
sexual behaviors overly
of children submissive
behavior
Child-Perpetrator Relationship:
Who sexually abuses children?
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The Child Victim’s Experience
Disturbance of sleep,
appetite, toileting
Long Term Consequences of
Sexual Abuse (De Bellis 2011)
• Delays in all • Increased rate of violent
developmental spheres crimes
manifested by stress • Substance use disorder
response dysregulation
• School discipline problems,
• Multiple health risk poor long-term intellectual
and academic achievement
behaviors /medical
illnesses • Greater likelihood of
becoming a teen parent
• Increased psychiatric
impairment/medical • Developmental
disorders/impaired
utilization attachment
Characteristics of Adolescent Sexual
Victimization
• Both young children and teens
are sexual abuse victims and
there are many similarities but
also differences…
• Perpetrator relationship
• Risk factors
• Professional approach
• Genital injury characteristics
• Post abuse medical care
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Adolescence: a Paradigm of Chronologic
Age Interacting with Biologic Change
• Individuals in the
developmental phase
between childhood and
adulthood marked by
rapid changes in growth:
• Physical
• Moral
• Psychosocial
• Cognitive
Normal Adolescent Developmental
Changes Set Up Risks
• Gradual development • Implementation of a
as an independent realistic plan to achieve
individual social and economic
• Evolution of satisfying, stability
realistic body image
• Transition from
• Appropriate control concrete to abstract
and expression of thinking
sexual drive
• Integration of values
• Expansion of applicable to life events
relationships outside
the home
Teen Risk Factors for Sexual
Victimization
• Personal
• Normal adolescent
interest in autonomy,
sexuality, peer acceptance
• Lack of knowledge and
skills to recognize
potentially dangerous life • Familial
situations • Parental history
• Experimentation with of substance use
drugs/alcohol • Household
• Past victimization violence
Teen Risk Factors for Sexual
Victimization
• Societal : Living where there is
• General tolerance for sexual violence and child
abuse in general
• Weak sanctions against sexual violence and abuse
• Strong belief in male sexual entitlement and
weakness of women’s rights
• Rigid gender roles and gender discrimination
The Many Contexts of Sexual Abuse
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Legal Protection: a Right for Children
National and
Exact wording/
International
understanding of
Laws: criminal, Goals: Child
laws differs across
family, juvenile, Protection,
jurisdictions and
international Prosecution of
may be
criminal, offenders,
intrinsically
humanitarian, community
divergent across
refugee and labor safety
settings and
law (UNVAC
cultures
2006)
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Case Discussion
• 15-year-old girl went with a 17-
year-old boy she liked after
school to his house in a different
neighborhood. They had not
dated before. At his house, they
talked for a while. He proposed
having sex. She said no. He held
her down and forced sex. He kept
her with him until after she was
due home. Then he took her
home and told her not to tell
anyone.
Consequences of Sexual Assault