Statistics on Sexual Violence in Jewish and Non-Jewish Communities
(Childhood Sexual Abuse, Sexual Assault, Clergy Sexual Abuse, Professional Sexual Abuse)
Disclaimer: Inclusion in this website does not constitute a recommendation
or endorsement. Individuals must decide for themselves if the resources meet
their own personal needs.
The
Awareness Center's Brochure
Articles/Statistics - Jewish Community
Sexual Abuse Statistics - by Dr. Michael J. Salamon
Letter To The Editor - by Rabbi Yosef Blau
General Articles
Sex Offender Statistics (1994)
Child abuse report shows 'just tip of iceberg' (04/29/2003)
A prospective investigation of the impact of childhood sexual abuse on the development of sexuality. (06/2003)
Violence at home 'hits children's IQ' (06/11/2003)
Abuse Risk Seen Worse As Families Change (11/13/2007)
Idaho Releases Yearly Report on Sexual Abuse (01/24/2008)
Teens
Also See:
Jewish Articles
2004 Israel - Data and Statistics
The Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel
http://www.1202.org.il/English/template/default.asp?siteId=1&maincat=18
The Rape Crisis Centers. Of this number there were 8,049 calls from victims who reported their assault for the first time.
In addition, the Rape Crisis Centers received 9,086 returning calls reporting sexual assault and 1,458 calls reporting distress or need for information.
Data Regarding the Assault Type
Out of all first time callers, 2,371 reported rape, 1,235 reported incest, 921 reported sexual harassment from which 52 were from soldiers.
The returning calls included 1,202 calls from women suffering from physical violence inflicted by their spouses, 103 calls from children suffering from violence in the family, 264 calls from women in different stages of divorce and 262 calls from women with an unwanted pregnancy.
Data Regarding the Age of the Victims
In 2004, 2,327 calls were received reporting sexual assault of children younger than 12 years old (32.4% of the total calls).
This figure reflects the vulnerability of children to sexual assault and sexual abuse. This vulnerability derives from the inherent innocence that is characteristic of children. This innocence creates a trust in adults and in their intentions with little ability to question their motives and actions, in addition to their disability to differentiate between right and wrong, according to the accepted standards of behavior in adult society.
These characteristics of sexual assault on children are even more pronounced when the abusive adult is a member of the family. Within the family unit, the family relations are based on the child's natural need for protection by the adults. Therefore, abuse by a family member is often continuous and stretches over a long period of time. The abuser takes advantage of his authority and of the innocence of the victim and above all, the victim's inability to stop the abuse. The victim usually accepts the abuse as part of regular family life. To question the abuser's actions means to be branded as a "bad girl", and to risk losing the abusive parent's "love and affection" as a result.
Data Regarding the Prior Relationship Between the Attacker and the Victim
The vast majority of sexual attacks were carried out by a person known to the victim and in an environment characterized as "safe". This data is contrary to the common belief that most rapes are carried out by a stranger.
In 2004, 22% of sexual assaults reported occurred in the victim's home. This figure reflects the fact that most sexual attacks happen in the "safety" of the home arena. Thus taking away her basic reliance on the safety of her home intensifies the victim's trauma.
Of the number of new calls, 451 callers reported an attack by a spouse, 1593 callers reported an attack by a member of the family, 1211 callers reported an attack by a friend or acquaintance and 585 callers reported an attack by an employer.
These figures show a large number of sexual attacks in cases where supremacy relations exist, such as an attack by an employer in the work place. In these cases the victim is often helpless, with no immediate strength to stand up to the attacker. In cases where strong trust relations exist between the victim and the assailant (such as in physical or psychological therapy) or in cases in which the victim is afraid for her position (such as at her work place, in the university or in the army), there is an added fear of speaking up against the attacker.
70 percent of child abuse carried out by family or
friends
By Ruth Sinai
Haaretz - Thu., January 29, 2004 Shvat 6, 5764
www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/388200.html
Parents warn their children not to talk to strangers, but fail to protect them from a much greater danger lying in wait. According to figures revealed yesterday at a conference on child abuse, some 70 percent of abuse of children below the age of 14 is carried out by friends, family members and acquaintances.
Welfare Minister Zevulun Orlev told lawyers, doctors and social workers participating in the conference that during the past five years, the number of reported cases of abuse involving children below the age of 14 has more than doubled.
In 2002, police referred some 8,300 children, suspected of involvement in physical or sexual abuse to Welfare Ministry case workers - compared to 3,921 in 1998.
Some 90 percent of the children were abuse victims while the remainder were referred as witnesses or were suspected of abusing other children.
According to Israeli law, children under the age of 14, who are sexually or otherwise abused by an individual responsible for their welfare, are questioned by social workers rather than by police investigators.
Orlev said he was astounded by the fact that 17 percent of child abusers are family members and another 50 percent are friends and acquaintances.
"This is another sign of the weakening of the family unit in Israeli society," Orlev said, noting the phenomenon is probably much more widespread, but that many cases go unreported because children often have great difficulty in revealing the secret of their abuse to others.
An initiative spearheaded by Devorah Horowitz, head of the Welfare Ministry's child investigation unit, is carrying out a study of children who do not report sexual abuse and another study of very young children.
Since a law went into effect in 1990, making it a legal obligation to report any case of abuse of children by adults in a position of responsibility over them (such as parents, teachers and counselors), the number of reported cases jumped dramatically.
Horowitz said that 60 to 70 percent of the reports come from the educational system. Most of the abuse victims are girls and 30 percent are boys.
Yitzhak Kadman, executive director of the National Council for the Child, lectured at the conference on the gray area between abuse and physical punishment that some parents describe as "educational."
"These are two continuous phenomena that resemble one another much more than they differ," Kadman said. "There is a slippery slope and it is thus forbidden to grant legitimacy to physical punishment because it sets the ground for physical abuse." Kadman cited a number of studies and legal opinions backing up his claim.
Orlev said the budget crisis has limited the number of treatment frameworks available to children who have suffered abuse of one form or another.
In addition to the center for abused children established by the Welfare Ministry in Jerusalem in 2003, another is set to open this year in Tel Aviv. Orlev said that six more such centers are needed around the country.
Steep rise in child sexual assault complaints among
Haredis
By Ruth Sinai, Haaretz Correspondent
Haaretz - October 29, 2007
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/918063.html
The National Council for the Child reports a steep rise in recent weeks in the number of requests for help from child sexual assault victims and their parents. Council head Yitzhak Kadman found that 30 percent of the new requests came from the ultra-Orthodox community, which had previously almost never contacted the organization about sexual assault.
The council provides volunteers, usually law students, who accompany sexual assault victims through the process of filing a police complaint, the investigation and criminal proceeding. More than 1,500 children have been helped in the seven years since this project began.
Kadman said that over the past few weeks, the council had fielded dozens of requests per week. Callers are referred to the council by police, juvenile investigators from the Social Affairs Ministry, welfare offices, doctors, schools and other community facilities.
Kadman sees the awakening of the Haredi sector as a real "breach of barriers." Contrary to expectation, the Haredim who apply for help do not want a Haredi volunteer to assist them, nor do they care whether the volunteer is a man or woman, Kadman said.
Sexual Abuse - Rabbi Avi Shafran Got It
Wrong
Sexual Abuse
by Rabbi Avi Shafran
New York Jewish Week - November 7, 2007
http://www.thejewishweek.com/viewArticle/c53_a964/Editorial__Opinion/Letter.html
The headline of your article on a recent study about sexual abuse in the Orthodox Jewish community ("No Religious Haven From Abuse: New study finds Orthodox women are sexually victimized as much as other American women are," Oct. 26) is grossly misleading.
A little Statistics 101: A "self-selecting" sample — like the women who responded to flyers providing questionnaires about their sexual lives and attitudes — is simply not comparable to another sample whose members were selected at random. For this reason, the study itself, which appears in the American Journal of Psychiatry, emphasizes that "those who chose to participate may not be representative of the [Orthodox] population," and that the unfeasibility of obtaining a representative sample constitutes a "major limitation of this study."
The study also notes that "there was a high proportion of subjects receiving mental health treatment in this group [the sample recruited for the study]."
And so the article's unequivocal claim that "Orthodox Jewish women suffer as much [abuse] as other American women," based as it is on comparing, in effect, apples and tractors, is not supported by the study cited.
If a self-selecting Orthodox sample — including "a high proportion of subjects receiving mental health treatment" — yields about the same percentage of abuse victims as a "larger world" representational one, it would seem to indicate, if anything at all, that the problem is considerably less common in the Orthodox community.
Abuse is a serious problem and, tragically, it exists and must be addressed in every community. Misrepresenting its extent in any subset of society does no service to that goal.
Rabbi Avi Shafran
Director of Public Affairs
Agudath Israel of America
Manhattan
___________________________
Missing The Point On Sexual Abuse
by Yaakov Blau
New York Jewish Week - November 14, 2007
http://www.thejewishweek.com/viewArticle/c53_a1041/Editorial__Opinion/Letter.html
In a Nov. 9 letter to the editor, Rabbi Avi Shafran questioned the validity of the study about sexual abuse in the Orthodox community. One point that he stressed more than once was that the sample had "a high proportion of subjects receiving mental health treatment." Somehow in Rabbi Shafran's mind, this undermines the legitimacy of what those subjects had to say.
Well, I think he missed a fairly obvious point. The reason so many receive mental health treatment is most likely because they suffered sexual abuse. I suppose that Rabbi Shafran thinks that all the abuse victims in the non-Orthodox world (he is willing to admit that abuse goes on in some parts of the world) live well-balanced lives with no aftereffects caused by the abuse they suffered.
In general, Rabbi Shafran seems to feel that his job is to always explain why the Agudah world does not share any of the problems that plague the rest of America, and his columns and letters are constantly exonerating that community of any problems. I think that the Agudah community would be much better served by facing up to its problems and dealing with them, rather than persisting to keep its head in the sand.
Rabbi Yaakov Blau
Teaneck, N.J.
___________________________
by Michael J. Salamon
New York Jewish Week - November 14, 2007
http://www.thejewishweek.com/viewArticle/c53_a1042/Editorial__Opinion/Letter.html
Rabbi Avi Shafran (Nov. 9) responded to your article "No Religious Haven From Abuse: New study finds Orthodox women are sexually victimized as much as other American women are" (Oct. 26) in a most disingenuous fashion. While his statement that the headline is grossly misleading may be accurate, his interpretation of the research is in fact more misleading.
It is true, as Rabbi Shafran states, that a self-selecting sample is not comparable to a sample selected at random. But to suggest that this implies that rates are lower is to display a deep misunderstanding of statistics. Comparability is affected by selection. However, to understand the true meaning of it in this case requires a knowledge of survey research and statistical design referred to as non-parametric
statistics. Someone with knowledge of these scientific techniques would in fact know that it is just as likely that this is an under-representation. In other words, based on this one study one might just as easily conclude that there may be a higher rate of abuse in the Orthodox community than in the general population.
Further, to imply that because many of these women are receiving mental health services somehow makes the study less reliable shows a complete lack of understanding of the trauma caused by sexual abuse. It is a fact, supported by an abundance of research over many years, that sexual trauma causes significant psychological problems for many people. Indeed, in randomly selected groups, those reporting a history of sexual abuse are also more likely to be receiving mental health services.
I suggest that Rabbi Shafran, or other doubters, speak with mental health providers in the Orthodox community. He will find that the problem is quite real and very much present. To dismiss this critical survey in so offhanded a fashion is to deny the community the help it needs.
by Michael J. Salamon
Senior Psychologist/Director
Adult Developmental Center
Hewlett, L.I.
Dr. Salamon is also on the Executive Board of Directors of The Awareness Center, Inc.
___________________________
by Yosef Blau
New York Jewish Week - November 12, 2007
http://www.thejewishweek.com/viewArticle/c53_a986/Editorial__Opinion/Letter.html
Rabbi Rabbi Avi Shafran's letter (Nov 9) questioning the accuracy of the study described in the article "No Religious Haven From Abuse" (Oct. 26) reflects both the strength and weakness of a professional defender of a community. Self esteem is protected but problems are denied rather than addressed. The study is about the effect going to Mikvah regularly hason marital happiness. Questions about health, both mental and physical, and history of sexual abuse were included to separate out other factors that might influence marital happiness. The results are limited to women who are neither too young nor to old to go to mikvah and who were willing to fill out a lengthy questionaire. It is difficult to claim that these limitations should bias the resulting percentage of
women who reported incidents of sexual abuse in either direction. The Orthodox Jewish community is begining to create mechanisms to protect our children and women. The assertion, which is not based on any study, that only a tiny percentage have suffered from abuse is not helpful.
2,000 complaints of sexual abuse filed by children under
12 in past year
By Ruth Sinai, Haaretz Correspondent
Haaretz - December 13, 2007
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/800600.html
The Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel received nearly 2,000 complaints of sexual abuse in the past year from children under the age of 12, and nearly 2,500 from teenagers aged 13-18.
In over half of the 9,000 new cases the crisis center dealt with this past year the victims were minors. In 60% of the cases involving children under the age of 12, the abuse included incest while 17% involved rape and 19% indecent acts.
The report states that in 72% of the cases involving children under the age of 12 the assaults occurred in either the victim or the perpetrator's residence, while 12% took place inside educational institutions. As much as 90% of the victims were assaulted by someone they knew.
These findings, which were organized as part of a report by the Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel called "Not in our school?", will be presented on Wednesday to Education Minister Yuli Tamir.
These assaults stem from "the innocent worldview of children, which creates an absolute trust in adults, without the ability to resist forcefully", the report reads, citing articles and victims' accounts of abuse.
Even at the later ages, from 13 to 18, around 80% of the perpetrators are known to the victim. As the ages of the victims rise, the percentage of cases involving incest drops, while those involving rape rises. In cases where the victim is between 13 and 18 years old, 41% involve rape, and 7% group rape. Incest was reported in 20% of the cases for this age group.
In this group, 17% of the assaults took place in educational institutions, of these, 11% were in religious yeshivas.
The editors of the report attribute the rise in cases of sexual assault against minors to the exposure of teenagers to "non-normative sexual behavior" on the internet and the media, and the weakening influence of parents and teachers as authority figures.
http://www.rainn.org/statistics.html
About three percent of American men —- a total of 2.78 million men—have experienced an attempted or completed rape in their lifetime. [Prevalence, Incidence and Consequences of Violence Against Women 1998.]
In 2002, one in every eight rape victims were male. [NCVS 2002]
About 44% of rape victims are under age 18. Three out of every twenty victims (15%) are under age 12. [Sex Offenses and Offenders. Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Department of Justice, 1997.]
Seven percent of girls in grades five to eight and twelve percent of girls in grades nine through twelve and said they had been sexually abused. [Commonwealth Fund Survey of the Health of Adolescent Girls, 1998.]
Three percent of boys in grades five through eight and five percent of boys in grades nine through twelve said they had been sexually abused. [Commonwealth Fund Survey of the Health of Adolescent Boys, 1998.]
· 93% of juvenile sexual assault victims knew their attacker; 34.2% were family members and 58.7% acquaintances. Only seven percent of the perpetrators were strangers to the victim. [Sexual Assault of Young Children as Reported to Law Enforcement. Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Department of Justice, 2000]
· In 1995, local child protective service agencies identified 126,000 children who were victims of either substantiated or indicated sexual abuse; of these, 75% were girls. Nearly 30% of child victims were between the ages of 4 and 7. [US Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Child Maltreatment, 1995.]
Silent Victims...
One of the most startling aspects of sex crimes is how many go unreported. The most common reasons given by victims for not reporting these crimes are the belief that it is a private or personal matter and that they fear reprisal from the assailant.
· In 2001, only 39% of rapes and sexual assaults were reported to law enforcement officials — about one in every three. [1999 NCVS]
· Of sexually abused children in grades five through twelve, 48% of the boys and 29% of the girls had told no one about the abuse—not even a friend or sibling. [Commonwealth Fund Survey of the Health of Adolescent Girls, 1998.]
The rapist isn't a masked man...
· Approximately 66% of rape victims know their assailant. [2000 NCVS.]
· Approximately 48% of victims are raped by a friend or acquaintance; 30% by a stranger; 16% by an intimate; 2% by another relative; and in 4% of cases the relationship is unknown. [2000 NCVS.]
And he's not hiding in the bushes...
[Statistics in this section are from: Sex Offenses and Offenders. Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Department of Justice, February 1997:
· About four out of ten sexual assaults take place at the victim's own home. Two in ten take place in the home of a friend, neighbor or relative. One in ten take place outside, away from home. And about one in 12 take place in a parking garage.
· More than half of all rape/sexual assault incidents were reported by victims to have occurred within one mile of their home or at their home.
· 43% of rapes occur between 6 pm and midnight. 24% occur between midnight and 6am. The other 33% take place between 6am and 6pm.
The Dangers of Youth
15% of victims are under age 12
29% are age 12-17
44% are under age 18
80% are under age 30
[SOO, 1997, 1999 NCVS]
· Age 12-34 are the highest risk years. Risk peaks in the late teens: girls 16 to 19 are four times more likely than the general population to be victims of rape, attempted rape or sexual assault. [2000 NCVS.]
The Criminal
· The average age of rapists at arrest is 31. Fifty-two percent are white; twenty-two percent of imprisoned rapists report that they are married. [SOO, 1997]
· Juveniles accounted for about 16% of forcible rape arrestees in 1995 and 17% of those arrested for other sex offenses [SOO, 1997]
· In about one out of three sexual assaults, the perpetrator was intoxicated—30% with alcohol, 4% with drugs. [Alcohol and Crime. Bureau of Justice Statistics, 1998]
· In one study, 98% of males who raped boys reported that they were heterosexual. [Sexual Abuse of Boys, Journal of the American Medical Association, December 2, 1998]
· In 2001, only about 7% of rapes involved the use of a weapon—two percent used a gun, and four percent used a knife. 86% of victims reported the use of physical force only, and 7% were unsure. [2000 NCVS.]
· Rapists are more likely to be serial criminals than serial rapists. In one study, 46% of rapists who were released from prison were rearrested within 3 years of their release for another crime -- 18.6% for a violent offense, 14.8% for a property offense, 11.2% for a drug offense and 20.5% for a public-order offense. [2002 RPR94]
The Punishment
· 61% of rapes/sexual assaults are not reported to the police. Those rapists, of course, never serve a day in prison. [1999 NCVS]
If the rape is reported to police, there is a 50.8% chance that an arrest will be made.
If an arrest is made, there is an 80% chance of prosecution.
If there is a prosecution, there is a 58% chance of a felony conviction.
If there is a felony conviction, there is a 69% chance the convict will spend time in jail.
So, even in the 39% of attacks that are reported to police, there is only a 16.3% chance the rapist will end up in prison.
Factoring in unreported rapes, about 6% of rapists—1 out of 16— will ever spend a day in jail. 15 out of 16 will walk free.
[Probability statistics compiled by NCPA from US Department of Justice statistics. See www.ncpa.org/studies/s229/s229.html]
For more statistics and links to all primary sources, see RAINN's Statistics Archive.
For information and resources on sexual assault, rape and drug-facilitated sexual assault, please visit www.911rape.org.
For more information and statistics, visit the U.S. Department of Justice's Bureau of Justice Statistics.
Child abuse report shows 'just tip of
iceberg'
Cape agency a safe place for children to talk
By Cynthia Mc Cormick, Staff Writer
Cape Cod Times - April 28, 2003
BARNSTABLE - On the fifth anniversary of Children's Cove, a Cape agency that works with children who have been sexually abused, officials have developed "a snapshot" of victims and abusers.
Five-year statistics
Of the 516 children interviewed by Children's Cove over the past five years: Under age 10, boys were almost as likely as girls to be victims of sexual abuse.With age 10 and older, females made up 73 percent of victims.
Biological fathers were reported as perpetrators of child sexual abuse more often than stepfathers, uncles and mothers' boyfriends combined.
It's not a pretty picture.
Since 1998, the staff at Children's Cove have evaluated more than 516 children, 90 percent of whom disclosed some form of sexual abuse, says Cove director Debbie Meier.
Statistics kept by the Cove, also known as the Cape Cod and Islands Child Advocacy Center, show that boys under 10 are almost as likely as young girls to be victims of sexual abuse; that females make up 73 percent of victims age 10 and over; and that biological fathers are reported as perpetrators of child sexual abuse more often than stepfathers, uncles and mothers' boyfriends combined.
"This is just the tip of the iceberg," Meier said. "It's a national problem and we're part of it. A child has to have made a disclosure to somebody before they got here. They are being brought in through DSS (the state Department of Social Services) and the police."
Located in a Cape-style house surrounded by lawn and walking paths, Children's Cove is designed to help children feel safe and comfortable when they are evaluated for sexual abuse.
A trained interviewer talks to children while police and child welfare officials observe on the other side of a two-way mirror. The interviewer wears an earpiece, so the officials can relay questions they want answered.
If a physical exam is called for, a specially trained nurse practitioner provides it in a room designed to soothe children with pleasant colors and stuffed animals for "support." Before Children's Cove opened in 1998, many child victims of sexual abuse had to travel to Children's Hospital in Boston for exams, Meier said.
"There's also counseling and support services for the victim, non-offending parents and siblings," she said.
High marks
Brian Glenny, first assistant district attorney for the Cape and Islands, gives Children's Cove high marks for the quality of its forensic evidence and for minimizing trauma to children.
"In the old days you used to have police departments, Department of Social Services and maybe the Department of Mental Health or the Department of
"Sometimes a child would be interviewed more than once, at different times and places by all these different people. (Now) the child only needs to get interviewed once."
Glenny said he doesn't know how many cases that go through Children's Cove end up being prosecuted. "Its goal is not to have successful prosecution. Its goal is to address the needs of the children," he said.
In general, Glenny said, since 1991 his office has had an 83 percent success rate in prosecuting child sex abuse cases.
Abuse includes any use of children for the sexual gratification of somebody who is older or in a position of power over a child, Meier said. That includes rape, molestation and having a child view pornographic material.
The Department of Social Services gets involved when a caregiver is accused of abuse.
Statistics questioned
The co-chairman of a fathers' rights group that has members on the Cape questioned the Cove statistics that more biological fathers than stepfathers or boyfriends are reported perpetrators.
Mike Franco of Holyoke and the Fatherhood Coalition, formerly called the Coalition for the Preservation of Fatherhood, said allegations of child sexual abuse can be used as a "trump card" by an ex-wife to get custody of a child.
"The first is, 'He's abusive to me,'" Franco said. If those claims aren't supported, "you might find the woman moving toward sexual abuse of the child. Once you make that claim, all contact with the child stops until further evaluation can ensure the child is perfectly safe."
Fathers' rights groups often quote author Diana Russell, who in her 1986 book on incest, "The Secret Trauma," says stepfather-daughter incest is more prevalent and severe than incest between biological fathers and daughters.
Some researchers say that while the risk of incest by a stepfather is higher, the actual number of cases of incest by biological fathers is higher, if only because all girls have biological fathers and only a fraction have stepfathers.
Meier says Children's Cove doesn't take cases brought by individual parents. She said the Cove is a neutral party and only works on cases brought to it through police or state social services officials.
Trained professionals
Glenny said Children's Cove employees are professionals who are trained not to contaminate evidence or ask leading questions. "It works out very well for us," he said. And "it lessens the trauma to the child. The person that goes in there feels like these people care."
Glenny said the types of cases presented by Children's Cove are interesting but probably not statistically relevant, since they only cover five years.
The district attorney's office helps fund Children's Cove, which has an annual budget of $425,000. The Cove also receives money from Barnstable County, a private foundation, the Department of Social Services and the state sexual abuse intervention network, known as SAIN. Cape Cod Hospital pays for the nurse practitioner and the Department of Mental Health also provides services.
The cut in state funding for social services has Meier worried about next year's budget. She said state funds of about $150,000 are funneled to Children's Cove through the Department of Social Services. But that money has not been earmarked for the Cove in the proposed budget released Wednesday by the House.
State Rep. Shirley Gomes said she's working on an amendment to earmark the funds specifically for Children's Cove.
"If Children's Cove were not to be funded, it would literally be going back to the Dark Ages of investigating child abuse cases," Glenny said.
"What we're here to do is to make sure this child gets whatever needs met. A person who is abused is very likely to be an abuser later on. We're able to address that issue, so those that are abused today do not abuse in the future."
Children report 74% of abusers are in family
A recently released report by Children's Cove profiles victims and perpetrators of child sexual abuse cases on the Cape and islands over five years.
From the beginning of February 1998 to the end of January of this year, the agency worked with 516 children.
The ratio of male to female victims under age 10 over the last five years was 47 percent to 53 percent. In some years, the percentage of male victims was higher; from February 1998 to January 1999, male victims made up 59 percent.
At age 10 and over, the percentage of reported male victims shrank to 27 percent. Children's Cove evaluates children from ages 2 to 17.
Sixty-five percent of reported perpetrators were adult males, with the next largest group being juvenile males, at 19 percent.
The number of juvenile male perpetrators has been steadily increasing each year.
About 40 percent of the reported perpetrators were immediate family members; 19 percent were acquaintances; and 34 percent were extended family.
Perpetrators were known to the child 93 percent of the time.
Acquaintance perpetrators included other students, teachers, coaches, church members and siblings' friends, followed by family friends, neighbors and baby sitters.
Over the last two years, Children's Cove has evaluated an increasing number of children under age 5.
Between the beginning of February 2002 and the end of January this year, the age categories with the highest number of evaluations for sexual abuse were 3- and 4-year-olds, with 18 and 15 reported victims in each age group, out of a total of 120 children.
Child Sexual Abuse ~
Disclosures
Among victims of sexual abuse, the inability to trust is pronounced, which also contributes to secrecy and non-disclosure. Source: Courtois & Watts, 1982.
Children often fail to report because of the fear that disclosure will bring consequences even worse than being victimized again. The victim may fear consequences from the family, feel guilty for consequences to the perpetrator, and may fear subsequent retaliatory actions from the perpetrator. Sources: Berlinger & Barbieri, 1984; Groth, 1979; Swanson & Biaggio, 1985.
Victims may be embarrassed or reluctant to answer questions about the sexual activity. Source: Berlinger & Barbieri, 1984.
Victims may also have a feeling that "something is wrong with me," and that the abuse is their fault. Sources: Johnson, 1987; Tsai & Wagner, l978.
In addition to "sexual guilt," there are several other types of guilt associated with the abuse, which include feeling different from peers, harboring vengeful and angry feelings toward both parents, feeling responsible for the abuse, feeling guilty about reporting the abuse, and bringing disloyalty and disruption to the family . Any of these feelings of guilt could outweigh the decision of the victim to report, the result of which is the secret may remain intact and undisclosed. Source: Courtois & Watts, 1982; Tsai & Wagner, l978.
A child's initial denial of sexual abuse should not be the sole basis of reassurance that abuse did not occur. Virtually all investigative protocols are designed to respond to only those children who have disclosed. Policies and procedures that are geared only to those children who have disclosed fail to recognize the needs of the majority of victims. Source: Sorensen & Snow, 1991.
Study of 630 cases of alleged sexual abuse of children from 1985 through 1989: Using a subset of 116 confirmed cases, findings indicated that 79 percent of the children of the study initially denied abuse or were tentative in disclosing. Of those who did disclose, approximately three-quarters disclosed accidentally. Additionally, of those who did disclose, 22 percent eventually recanted their statements. Source: Sorensen & Snow, 1991.
Young victims may not recognize their victimization as sexual abuse. Source: Gilbert, l988.
There is the clinical assumption that children who feel compelled to keep sexual abuse a secret suffer greater psychic distress than victims who disclose the secret and receive assistance and support. Source: Finkelhor & Browne, 1986.
Early identification of sexual abuse victims appears to be crucial to the reduction of suffering of abused youth and to the establishment of support systems for assistance in pursuing appropriate psychological development and healthier adult functioning . As long as disclosure continues to be a problem for young victims, then fear, suffering, and psychological distress will, like the secret, remain with the victim.
Sources: Bagley, 1992; Bagley, 1991; Finkelhor et al. 1990; Whitlock & Gillman, 1989.
Child Sexual Abuse ~
Allegations
In a twelve state study of approximately 9000 divorces cases, child sexual abuse allegations were made in less than 2% of contested divorces involving child custody. Source: Association of Family Conciliation Courts, 1990.
Reported cases of child sexual abuse reached epidemic proportions, with a reported 322 percent increase from 1980 to 1990. Source: Sorensen & Snow, 1991.
Bruises, burns, and broken bones are more easily identified as child abuse than is sexual assault. Source: Farrell, 1988.
This crime must usually be proven without corroboration or physical evidence. Source: Janssen, 1984.
A study conducted at Children's Hospital Medical Center of Cincinnati (Amy Arszman Daso and Robert Shapiro, M.D) indicates that child sexual abuse allegations should be taken seriously and found children's testimony more reliable than physical exams in cases of sexual abuse. The researchers reviewed the records of 31 pedophiles who confessed between 1994 and 1999. The 31 perpetrators confessed to a total of 101 acts of sexual abuse, some of which they committed multiple times. The perpetrators abused 47 children. The 45 old enough to provide a history described 111 acts of sexual abuse. "Physical exams are an unreliable indicator of sexual abuse," says Dr. Shapiro. "We're not saying that children never make things up, but the responsible reaction is to listen carefully to allegations of abuse so that abused children will be identified and false allegations recognized." (May 2000)
Contact: Jim Feuer (EMail: jfeuer@chmcc.org), Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, 513-636-4420
Child Abuse & Child Sexual Abuse ~
Substantiated
Composition of substantiated child abuse in 2000: 879,000 children were victims of child maltreatment.
Neglect ~ 63%
Physical ~ 19%
Sexual ~ 10%
Psychological ~ 8%
Victimization rates declined as age increased. Rate of victimization per 1,000 children of the same age group:
Birth to 3 years old = 15.7 victims per 1,000.
Ages 16 and 17 = 5.7 victims per 1,000.
Except for victims of sexual abuse, rates were similar for male and female victimization: 11.2 and 12.8 per 1,000 children respectively.
Rate of sexual abuse by gender:
1.7 victims per 1,000 female children
0.4 victims per 1,000 male children.
Rate of child abuse by race:
White = 51%
African American = 25%
Hispanic = 15%
American Indian/Alaska Natives = 2%
Asian/Pacific Islanders = 1%
The comparative annual rate of child victims: decreased steadily from 15.3 victims per 1,000 children in 1993 to 11.8 victims per 1,000 children in 1999; then increased to 12.2 per 1,000 children in 2000.Whether this is a trend cannot be determined until additional data are collected. Source: US Dept of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children & Families, National Clearinghouse on Child Abuse and Neglect, 2000.
An average of 5.5 children per 10,000 enrolled in day care are sexually abused, an average of 8.9 children out of every 10,000 are abused in the home. Source: Finkelhor & Williams, 1988.
In the adult retrosptective study, victimization was reported by 27 percent of the women and 16 percent of the men. The median age for the occurrence of reported abuse was 9.9 for boys and 9.6 for girls. Victimization occurred before age eight for 22 percent of boys and for 23 percent of girls. Most of the abuse of both boys and girls was by offenders 10 or more years older than their victims. Girls were more likely than boys to disclose the abuse. Forty-two percent of the women and thirty-three percent of the men reported never having disclosed the experience to anyone.Source: Finkelhor et al., 1990.
"WHEN SEXUALLY abused boys are not treated, society must later deal with the resulting problems, including crime, suicide, drug use and more sexual abuse, said the study's author, Dr. William C. Holmes of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine." [snip] "The earlier studies found that one-third of juvenile delinquents, 40 percent of sexual offenders and 76 percent of serial rapists report they were sexually abused as youngsters." [snip] "The suicide rate among sexually abused boys was 11Æ2 to 14 times higher, and reports of multiple substance abuse among sixth-grade boys who were molested was 12 to 40 times greater." [snip] "Holmes said a review of the studies leads him to believe 10 percent to 20 percent of all boys are sexually abused in some way. But widely varying definitions of sexual abuse in the studies and differences in who was being studied make it difficult to accurately gauge the prevalence of sexual abuse, he said." Full Story at MSNBC News, Dec 1998 (Note: may be archived).
Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS):
Sexual assault of young children as reported to law enforcement: Victim, incident, and offender characteristics (Acrobat PDF or ASCII text).
National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS), ~ regarding sexual assault, especially of young children; based on reports from law enforcement agencies of 21 States and covering the years 1991 through 2002 (or, use the BJS search to find these documents).
The July 2000 NIBRS report presents sexual assault in 4 categories:
Forcible rape,
Forcible sodomy,
Sexual assault with an object, and
Forcible fondling.
Findings include statistics on the incidence of sexual assault, the victims, their offenders, gender, response to these crimes, locality, time of incident, the levels of victim injury, victims' perceptions of offenders' ages, and victim-offender relationships, and other detailed characteristics.
Highlights from 2000 include the following as reported to law enforcement:
67% of victims of sexual assault were juveniles (under age 18);
34% of sexual assault victims were under age 12;
1 of every 7 victims of sexual assault were under age 6;
40% of offenders who victimized children under age 6 were juveniles (under age 18).
Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS)
NOTE: For information on the investigation and forensic psychology aspects of child sexual victimization, Dr. Suzanne Sgroi is an excellent resource (Law Enforcement And Child Abuse, by Sgroi and co-authored by law enforcement officer, Patricia Graves).
Excerpt from Sgroi's book review: "Helping sexually abused children depends on the combined efforts of law enforcement, medical, social service, and prosecution personnel. It is essential for those in each field to recognize and understand the others' responsibilities in dealing with child sexual abuse. Only then can we learn how best to help each other to help the victims and their families. As experience, research, and learning advance. It becomes increasingly clear that the police officer -- and indeed the entire criminal justice system -- are an integral part of identifying the problem, protecting the victim, and remedying the situation."
Leverich GS, Altshuler LL, Frye MA, Suppes T, Keck PE, McElroy SL, Denicoff KD, Obrocea G, Nolen WA, Kupka R, Walden J, Grunze H, Perez S, Luckenbaugh DA, Post RM.
J Clin Psychiatry 2003 May; 64(5):506-515
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Patients with bipolar I or II disorder (DSM-IV criteria) diagnosed with structured interviews were evaluated . . . The 34% of patients with a history of suicide attempts . . . had a greater positive family history of drug abuse and suicide (or attempts); a greater personal history of early traumatic stressors . . . In a hierarchical logistic regression, a history of sexual abuse, lack of confidant prior to illness onset, more prior hospitalizations for depression, suicidal thoughts when depressed, and cluster B personality disorder remained significantly associated with a serious suicide attempt.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Backlash_ology/
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BACKGROUND: Clinical factors related to suicide and suicide attempts have been studied much more extensively in unipolar depression compared with bipolar disorder. We investigated demographic and course-of-illness variables to better understand the incidence and potential clinical correlates of serious suicide attempts in 648 outpatients with bipolar disorder. METHOD: Patients with bipolar I or II disorder (DSM-IV criteria) diagnosed with structured interviews were evaluated using self-rated and clinician-rated questionnaires to assess incidence and correlates of serious suicide attempts prior to study entry. Clinician prospective ratings of illness severity were compared for patients with and without a history of suicide attempt. RESULTS: The 34% of patients with a history of suicide attempts, compared with those without such a history, had a greater positive family history of drug abuse and suicide (or attempts); a greater personal history of early traumatic stressors and more stressors both at illness onset and for the most recent episode; more hospitalizations for depression; a course of increasing severity of mania; more Axis I, II, and III comorbidities; and more time ill on prospective follow-up. In a hierarchical logistic regression, a history of sexual abuse, lack of confidant prior to illness onset, more prior hospitalizations for depression, suicidal thoughts when depressed, and cluster B personality disorder remained significantly associated with a serious suicide attempt. CONCLUSION: Our retrospective findings, supplemented by prospective follow-up, indicate that a history of suicide attempts is associated with a more difficult course of bipolar disorder and the occurrence of more psychosocial stressors at many different time domains. Greater attention to recognizing those at highest risk for suicide attempts and therapeutic efforts aimed at some of the correlates identified here could have an impact on bipolar illness-related morbidity and mortality.
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From: Stanley Foundation Bipolar Treatment Outcome Network (all authors); Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Mental Health, Biological Psychiatry Branch, Bethesda, Md. (Drs. Denicoff, Obrocea, and Post, Ms. Leverich, Ms. Perez, and Mr. Luckenbaugh); VA Medical Center, Los Angeles, Calif. (Drs. Altshuler and Frye); Bipolar Disorder Clinic and Research Program, Department of Psychiatry, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas (Dr. Suppes); the Biological Psychiatry Program, Department of Psychiatry, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, Ohio (Drs. Keck and McElroy); University Medical Centre Utrecht and Altrecht Institute for Mental Health Care, Utrecht, the Netherlands (Drs. Nolen and Kupka); University of Freiburg, Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Freiburg, Germany (Dr. Walden); and Ludwig-Maximilians University, Psychiatric Clinic, Munich, Germany (Dr. Grunze).
The US Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, has just released
a report:
"Rape and Sexual Assault: Reporting to Police and Medical Attention, 1992-2000."
The report looks at patterns of rape, attempted rape, and other sexual assaults. It provides basic stats on occurrence, data on injuries and treatment, reporting (including reasons given for not reporting), relationship between the person attacked and the offender, etc.
Here are a few excerpts:
[excerpts]
Among injured female victims of rape or sexual assault, half of those indicating that the crime was reported to the police received medical treatment, compared to a fifth of those indicating the crimes were unreported
<snip>
Most rapes and sexual assaults were committed against females: Female victims accounted for 94% of all completed rapes, 91% of all attempted rapes, and 89% of all completed and attempted sexual assaults, 1992-2000.
Because of the small number of sample cases of rape and sexual assault against males, analysis in the remainder of this report relates to female victims only. Data are aggregated across 9 years to produce average annual estimates.
<snip>
When victims of rape, attempted rape, and sexual assault did not report the crime to the police, the most often cited reason was that the victimization was a personal matter:
Rape: personal matter, 23.3%; fear of reprisal, 16.3%; police biased, 5.8%.
Attempted rape: personal matter, 16.8%; fear of reprisal, 11.3%; protect offender, 9. 9%.
Completed and attempted sexual assault:
personal matter, 25.3%; reported to different official, 12.4%; fear of reprisal, 11.3%.
The victim-offender relationship and informing the police
The closer the relationship between the female victim and the offender, the greater the likelihood that the police would not be told about the rape or sexual assault.
When the offender was a current or former husband or boyfriend, about three-fourths of all victimizations were not reported to police (77% of completed rapes, 77% of attempted rapes, and 75% of sexual assaults not reported).
When the offender was a friend or acquaintance, 61% of completed rapes, 71% of attempted rapes, and 82% of sexual assaults were not reported.
When the offender was a stranger, 54% of completed rapes, 44% of attempted rapes, and 34% of sexual assaults were not reported to the police.
[end excerpts]
The Department of Justice provides links to a text version of the report, a pdf version of the report, and an ordering form for a hard copy of the report at: http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/abstract/rsarp00.htm
If that URL is too long for your browser or doesn't work, try going to the home page of the Department of Justice's Bureau of Statistics
(http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/whtsnw2.htm) and finding it from there.
It is estimated 60 million survivors of childhood sexual abuse live in America today.
Approximately 31 percent of women in prison state they had been abused as children.
Approximately 95 percent of teenage prostitutes have been sexually abused.
Long-term effects of child abuse include fear, anxiety, depression, anger, hostility, inappropriate sexual behavior, poor self esteem, tendency toward substance abuse and difficulty with close relationships.
Adolescents with a history of sexual abuse are significantly more likely than their counterparts to engage in sexual behavior that puts them at risk for HIV infection.
Young girls who are forced to have sex are three times more likely to develop psychiatric disorders or abuse alcohol and drugs in adulthood than girls who are not sexually abused.
Among both adolescent girls and boys, a history of sexual or physical abuse appears to increase the risk of eating disorders.
- From the prevent-abuse-now.com Web site
It is estimated that there are 60 million survivors of childhood sexual abuse in America today. Source: Forward, 1993.
Approximately 31% of women in prison state that they had been abused as children. Source: United States Department of Justice, 1991.
Approximately 95% of teenage prostitutes have been sexually abused. Source: CCPCA, 1992.
It is estimated that children with disabilities are 4 to 10 times more vulnerable to sexual abuse than their non-disabled peers. Source: National Resource Center on Child Sexual Abuse, 1992.
Long term effects of child abuse include fear, anxiety, depression, anger, hostility, inappropriate sexual behavior, poor self esteem, tendency toward substance abuse and difficulty with close relationships.Source: Browne & Finkelhor, 1986.
Clinical findings of adult victims of sexual abuse include problems in interpersonal relationships associated with an underlying mistrust. Generally, adult victims of incest have a severely strained relationship with their parents that is marked by feelings of mistrust, fear, ambivalence, hatred, and betrayal. These feelings may extend to all family members. Source: Tsai and Wagner, 1978.
Guilt is universally experienced by almost all victims. Courtois and Watts described the "sexual guilt" as "guilt derived from sexual pleasure" Source: Tsai and Wagner, l978.
Sexuality is regarded not simply as a part of the self limited to genitals, discrete behaviors, or biological aspects of reproduction, but is more properly understood as one component of the total personality that affects one's concept of personal identity and self-esteem. Source: Whitlock & Gillman, 1989.
Sexual victimization may profoundly interfere with and alter the development of attitudes toward self, sexuality, and trusting relationships during the critical early years of development. Source: Tsai & Wagner, 1984.
If the child victim does not resolve the trauma, sexuality may become an area of adult conflict. Source: Courtois & Watts, 1982; Tsai & Wagner, 1984.
There is the clinical assumption that children who feel compelled to keep sexual abuse a secret suffer greater psychic distress than victims who disclose the secret and receive assistance and support. Source: Finkelhor & Browne, 1986.
Early identification of sexual abuse victims appears to be crucial to the reduction of suffering of abused youth and to the establishment of support systems for assistance in pursuing appropriate psychological development and healthier adult functioning . As long as disclosure continues to be a problem for young victims, then fear, suffering, and psychological distress will, like the secret, remain with the victim. Sources: Bagley, 1992; Bagley, 1991; Finkelhor et al. 1990; Whitlock & Gillman, 1989.
Adolescents with a history of sexual abuse are significantly more likely than their counterparts to engage in sexual behavior that puts them at risk for HIV infection, according to Dr. Larry K. Brown and associates, from Rhode Island Hospital, in Providence.
Adolescents with a history of sexual abuse are significantly more likely than their counterparts to engage in sexual behavior that puts them at risk for HIV infection, according to Dr. Larry K. Brown and associates, from Rhode Island Hospital, in Providence. Inconsistent condom use was three times more likely among youths who had been sexually abused than among the 55 who had not. A history of sexual abuse was also significantly associated with less impulse control and higher rates of sexually transmitted diseases. According to Dr. Brown, "These results suggest two things. Abused kids need adequate counseling around abuse issues. A lot of these kids keep re-experiencing the anxiety and trauma for years." The second issue, he said, is that "most therapy does not address current sexual behavior" and the anxieties that sexually abused adolescents experience. Source: Larry K. Brown, M.D., et al, American Journal of Psychiatry 2000;157:1413-1415.
Young girls who are forced to have sex are three times more likely to develop psychiatric disorders or abuse alcohol and drugs in adulthood, than girls who are not sexually abused. Sexual abuse was also more strongly linked with substance abuse than with psychiatric disorders. It was also suggested that sexual abuse may lead some girls to become sexually active at an earlier age and seek out older boyfriends who might, in turn, introduce them to drugs. Psychiatric disorders were from 2.6 to 3.3 times more common among women whose CSA included intercourse, and the risk of substance abuse was increased more than fourfold, according to the results. Family factors -- parental education, parenting behavior, family financial status, church attendance -- had little impact on the prevalence of psychiatric or substance abuse disorders among these women, the investigators observe. Similarly, parental psychopathology did not predict the association between CSA and later psychopathology. Source: Kenneth S. Kendler, M.D., et al, Medical College of Virginia Commonwealth University, Archives of General Psychiatry 2000;57:953-959.
Among both adolescent girls and boys, a history of sexual or physical abuse appears to increase the risk of disordered eating behaviors, such as self-induced vomiting or use of laxatives to avoid gaining weight. Among those at increased risk for disordered eating were respondents who had experienced sexual or physical abuse and those who gave low ratings to family communication, parental caring and parental expectations. In light of these findings, the researchers conclude that "strong familial relationships may decrease the risk for disordered eating among youth reporting abuse experiences." Source: Dr. Dianne Neumark-Sztainer, et al, University of Minneapolis, International Journal of Eating Disorders 2000;28:249-258.
Young girls who are sexually abused are more likely to develop eating disorders as adolescents. The findings also add to a growing body of research suggesting that trauma in childhood increases the risk of developing an eating disorder. Abused girls were more dissatisfied with their weight and more likely to diet and purge their food by vomiting or using laxatives and diuretics. Abused girls were also more likely to restrict their eating when they were bored or emotionally upset. Wonderlich suggests that abused girls might experience higher levels of emotional distress, possibly linked to their abuse, and have trouble coping. Food restriction and perhaps other eating disorder behaviors may (reflect) efforts to cope with such experiences. The report also indicates that while girls who were abused were less likely to exhibit perfectionist tendencies (such as making extreme efforts to avoid disappointing others and a need to be 'the best'), they tended to want thinner bodies than girls who had not been abused. Source: Stephen A. Wonderlich, M.D., et al, University of North Dakota School of Medicine and Health Sciences in Fargo, Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry 2000;391277-1283.
US Healthcare system missing most mentally ill children and adolescents. More than 7 out of 10 American adolescents with mental health problems are getting no care, according to data released today at the Surgeon General's Conference on Children's Mental Health.
Bureau of Justice Statistics on Sex Offenders
On a given day in 1994 there were approximately 234,000 offenders convicted of rape or sexual assault under the care, custody, or control of corrections agencies; nearly 60% of these sex offenders are under conditional supervision in the community.
The median age of the victims of imprisoned sexual assaulters was less than 13 years old; the median age of rape victims was about 22 years.
An estimated 24% of those serving time for rape and 19% of those serving time for sexual assault had been on probation or parole at the time of the offense for which they were in State prison in 1991.
Offenders who had victimized a child were on average 5 years older than the violent offenders who had committed their crimes against adults.
Nearly 25% of child victimizers were age 40 or older, but about 10% of the inmates with adult victims fell in that age range.
Convicted rape and sexual assault offenders serving time in State prisons report that two-thirds of their victims were under the age of 18, and 58% of those--or nearly 4 in 10 imprisoned violent sex offenders--said their victims were aged 12 or younger.
In 90% of the rapes of children less than 12 years old, the child knew the offender, according to police-recorded incident data.
Among victims 18 to 29 years old, two-thirds had a prior relationship with the rapist.
Four datasets (the FBI's UCR arrests, State felony court convictions, prison admissions, and the National Crime Victimization Survey) all point to a sex offender who is older than other violent offenders, generally in his early 30's, and more likely to be white than other violent offenders.
A prospective investigation of the impact of childhood
sexual abuse on the development of sexuality.
Noll JG, Trickett PK, Putnam FW.
J Consult Clin Psychol. 2003 Jun;71(3):575-86.
The sexual attitudes and activities of 77 sexually abused and 89 comparison women (mean age = 20.41, SD = 3.38) were assessed 10 years after disclosure in a longitudinal, prospective study of the long-term effects of childhood sexual abuse. Abused participants were more preoccupied with sex, younger at first voluntary intercourse, more likely to have been teen mothers, and endorsed lower birth control efficacy than comparison participants. When psychological functioning earlier in development was examined, sexual preoccupation was predicted by anxiety, sexual aversion was predicted by childhood sexual behavior problems, and sexual ambivalence (simultaneous sexual preoccupation and sexual aversion) was predicted by pathological dissociation. Findings also indicate that biological father abuse may beassociated with greater sexual aversion and sexual ambivalence.
Author contact: University of Southern California School of Social Work, Los Angeles 90089-0411, USA. jennien@usc.edu
Violence at home 'hits children's
IQ'
BBC News (UK edition) - June 11, 2003
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/2981312.stm
Surveys suggest the problem is widespread
Violence between parents can reduce young children's IQ levels, researchers say.
A study of 1,116 pairs of five-year-old twins in the UK suggests that in homes where mothers are abused by their partners, the children's IQs are on average eight points lower than usual.
The researchers say this is the equivalent of a three-inch reduction in physical height - and even if not a lasting effect, is happening just as the children start school.
The study was carried out by researchers at King's College London in the UK and Boston University in the United States.
They studied identical and fraternal twins to minimise the likelihood that the children with lower IQs had simply inherited them.
Later problems
In the study, children whose mothers reported no domestic violence had IQs of about 100, the average in the general population.
Those exposed to high levels of domestic violence had IQs that were eight points lower on average - a "moderately strong" effect.
Karestan Koenen, of the department of child and adolescent psychiatry at Boston, said: "This finding is important because low IQ at age five is a risk factor for negative outcomes such as school failure, and later, juvenile delinquency."
Terrie Moffitt of the institute of psychiatry at King's said: "Eight IQ points may not sound like very much, but it is equivalent to three inches on the height chart for five year olds.
"If domestic violence stunted children's physical growth by three inches, doctors would take that seriously.
"We do not know if this effect is temporary or lasting, but we do know that it is present at the age when children begin school, and their mental growth is very important at that age."
Possible causes
Prof Moffitt said the effect put the children about six months behind their peers in terms of their development.
She said it had been known for a few years that - surprisingly - environmental factors including levels of stress could affect the development of intelligence.
Their current study would also be looking at such factors as how much children were read to by their mothers and what range of stimulating toys they had available, but it had begun with the violence issue.
This accounted for probably about 10% of the environmental impact on IQ.
As to why it had an effect, that was not clear, but it could be indirect as well as a direct result of having witnessed violence.
"It could have been for example that depression in the mother due to violence meant she failed to care for the children properly."
Abuse Risk Seen Worse As Families
Change
By DAVID CRARY
The Associated Press - Saturday, November 17, 2007; 9:18 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/17/AR2007111700865_pf.html
NEW YORK -- Six-year-old Oscar Jimenez Jr. was beaten to death in California, then buried under fertilizer and cement. Two-year-old Devon Shackleford was drowned in an Arizona swimming pool. Jayden Cangro, also 2, died after being thrown across a room in Utah.
In each case, as in many others every year, the alleged or convicted perpetrator had been the boyfriend of the child's mother _ men thrust into father-like roles which they tragically failed to embrace.
Every case is different, every family is different. Some single mothers bring men into their lives who lovingly help raise children when the biological father is gone for good.
Nonetheless, many scholars and front-line caseworkers interviewed by The Associated Press see the abusive-boyfriend syndrome as part of a broader trend that deeply worries them. They note an ever-increasing share of America's children grow up in homes without both biological parents, and say the risk of child abuse is markedly higher in the nontraditional family structures.
"This is the dark underbelly of cohabitation," said Brad Wilcox, a sociology professor at the University of Virginia. "Cohabitation has become quite common, and most people think, 'What's the harm?' The harm is we're increasing a pattern of relationships that's not good for children."
The existing data on child abuse in America is patchwork, making it difficult to track national trends with precision. The most recent federal survey on child maltreatment tallies nearly 900,000 abuse incidents reported to state agencies in 2005, but it does not delve into how rates of abuse correlate with parents' marital status or the makeup of a child's household.
Similarly, data on the roughly 1,500 child-abuse fatalities that occur annually in the United States leaves unanswered questions. Many of those deaths result from parental neglect, rather than overt physical abuse. Of the 500 or so deaths caused by physical abuse, the federal statistics do not specify how many were caused by a stepparent or unmarried partner of the parent.
However, there are many other studies that, taken together, reinforce the concerns. Among the findings:
Children living in households with unrelated adults are nearly 50 times as likely to die of inflicted injuries as children living with two biological parents, according to a study of Missouri abuse reports published in the journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics in 2005.
Children living in stepfamilies or with single parents are at higher risk of physical or sexual assault than children living with two biological or adoptive parents, according to several studies co-authored by David Finkelhor, director of the University of New Hampshire's Crimes Against Children Research Center.
Girls whose parents divorce are at significantly higher risk of sexual assault, whether they live with their mother or their father, according to research by Robin Wilson, a family law professor at Washington and Lee University.
"All the emphasis on family autonomy and privacy shields the families from investigators, so we don't respond until it's too late," Wilson said. "I hate the fact that something dangerous for children doesn't get responded to because we're afraid of judging someone's lifestyle."
Census data leaves no doubt that family patterns have changed dramatically in recent decades as cohabitation and single-parenthood became common. Thirty years ago, nearly 80 percent of America's children lived with both parents. Now, only two-thirds of them do. Of all families with children, nearly 29 percent are now one-parent families, up from 17 percent in 1977.
The net result is a sharp increase in households with a potential for instability, and the likelihood that adults and children will reside in them who have no biological tie to each other.
"I've seen many cases of physical and sexual abuse that come up with boyfriends, stepparents," said Eliana Gil, clinical director for the national abuse-prevention group Childhelp.
"It comes down to the fact they don't have a relationship established with these kids," she said.
"Their primary interest is really the adult partner, and they may find themselves more irritated when there's a problem with the children."
That was the case with Jayden Cangro.
In July 2006, his mother's boyfriend, Phillip Guymon, hurled the 2-year-old nine feet across a room in Murray, Utah, because he balked at going to bed. The child died from his injuries.
Jayden's mother, Carly Moore, has undergone therapy since the killing. Yet she continues to second-guess herself about her two-year relationship with Guymon.
"There's so much guilt," she said in a telephone interview. "I never saw him hit my kids, ever. But he was gruff in his manner _ there were signs that he wasn't most pleasant person for kids to be around."
Guymon has been sentenced to five years in prison for second-degree felony child abuse homicide. Moore thinks the penalty is far too light.
"It's a hard thing," she said, recalling Jayden's death. "You go off to work, you say, 'See you later,' and then everything's completely shattered in a split second."
Some women can't see the trouble even when it's right in front of them.
Jennifer Harvey of Springfield, Mo., acknowledged in court last summer that she continued to date a man for two months after becoming suspicious that he had killed her 18-month-old son, Gavin.
"I was in denial," said Harvey, who was placed on five years' probation for not acting on her suspicions. The boyfriend, Joseph Haslett, was sentenced to life in prison for suffocating the toddler with a headlock.
The slaying of toddler Devon Shackleford in 2004 was premeditated.
Derek Chappell, who was sentenced to death this month, considered Devon an obstacle to an on-again, off-again relationship with the boy's mother, and drowned him in an apartment complex's swimming pool in Mesa, Ariz.
The mother, Kristal Frank, has created a Web site in memory of her son, full of reminiscences and snapshots. Chappell is referred to only as "that inhumane thing."
Such cases trigger a visceral reaction, but there are no simple solutions. Some of the worst cases of child abuse involve biological parents, and examples abound of children thriving in nontraditional households
"There's no going back to the past," said Washington and Lee's Robin Wilson. "We don't tell people who they can cohabit with. We don't tell them they can't have children out of wedlock."
There are, of course, some initiatives aimed at reducing the percentage of children raised by single parents. That's one of the goals of the Bush administration's Healthy Marriage Initiative.
"The risk (of abuse) to children outside a two-parent household is greater," said Susan Orr, one of the top child-welfare specialists in the Department of Health and Human Services. "Does that mean all single parents abuse their children? Of course not. But the risk is certainly there, and it's useful to know that."
As with many local programs, the federal effort encourages single parents to at least consider marriage, while other programs focus on broadening the support network for single parents. One long-standing initiative, the Nurse-Family Partnership, has lowered abuse rates by arranging for nurses to visit low-income, first-time mothers throughout their pregnancy and after their child is born.
Many social workers say the emphasis should be on nurturing healthy relationships, whether or not the parent is married.
"The primary thing is to have adults around who care about these kids, whatever shape it takes," said Zeinab Chahine, who was a New York City child-protection caseworker and administrator for 22 years before taking a high-level job in July with Casey Family Programs.
Chahine said caseworkers need to learn as much as possible, in a nonconfrontational manner, about the personal dynamics in at-risk households. Is there an unmarried partner who spends time there, or a newly arrived stepparent? Does that person care about the children, or consider them a nuisance? Is a criminal background check warranted?
"We start from perspective that the mom is as concerned about her kids as we are," Chahine said. "We can try to help her see the need for us to look into the situation."
Judith Schagrin, a Baltimore-based social worker engaged in child welfare for 24 years, said live-in boyfriends can be valuable resources for a single mother and her children. Some even have been awarded custody of children as an alternative to foster care while the mother is in jail.
"We look at the relationship the kid has with whomever is around _ is it supportive or destructive?" Schagrin said. "Does the mother have a long-term, stable relationship with this individual, or does she have rotating list of partners coming in and out?"
In the real world, however, learning crucial details about a potentially fragile family is not easy.
"The field struggles with the balance between intrusion in private matters and awareness of significant risks to the child," said Fred Wulczyn, a research fellow at the University of Chicago's Chapin Hall Center for Children.
"With a social worker who's in the house on a once-a-month basis, how good do we expect our diagnostics to be?" Wulczyn asked. "Achieving the right balance, so you never have to ponder 'What if?' _ that's hard to do."
The sensitivity of probing into private lives is one of many problems underlying the lack of definitive national data that correlates child abuse with parents' marital status and household makeup. Some conservative commentators say "political correctness" is partly to blame _ namely a reluctance to press for data that might reflect negatively on single motherhood.
Another problem is lack of thoroughness and consistency among the states as they forward abuse reports to federal agencies. Differing definitions of "household" and varying efforts to ascertain marital status result in a statistical "hodgepodge," according to Elliott Smith, who oversees a national archive of child-abuse research at Cornell University.
Among child-welfare specialists, there is hope that the statistical gaps will be filled by a comprehensive federal survey, the National Incidence Study, that will be completed next year.
The previous version of the study, released in 1996, concluded that children of single parents had a 77 percent greater risk of being harmed by physical abuse than children living with both parents. But the new version will delve much deeper into the specifics of family structure and cohabitation, according to project director Andrea Sedlak.
"We can ask the questions," Sedlak said. "But it's hard to look at cohabiting. It could well be there will be too much missing data to make definitive statements."
Long term, many child-welfare advocates say economic and social changes are needed, so day-care options improve and young men in poor communities have job prospects that make marriage seem more feasible. There's also agreement that many adults in high-risk households need better parenting skills _ whether it's the harried young mothers often guilty of harmful neglect or the boyfriends and stepfathers often responsible for physical abuse.
"These boyfriends increasingly have been raised without fathers and been abused themselves," said Patrick Fagan, a family-policy specialist with the conservative Family Research Council. "Among the inner-city poor, the turnover of male partners is high. Where's a boy getting the model of what a father is like?"
Oscar Jimenez Jr., the San Jose, Calif., boy found buried under cement and fertilizer, did have a biological father who was devoted to him. But the father, Oscar Sr., separated from Oscar Jr.'s mother in 2002 and was prevented from seeing his son in the weeks before the boy's death in February, allegedly from a beating by live-in boyfriend and ex-convict Samuel Corona.
The mother, Kathyrn Jimenez, says she, like her son, was abused by Corona, yet she has pleaded guilty to three felony charges for assisting him _ driving with him from San Jose to Phoenix to hide her son's remains, then keeping quiet about the killing for months.
Kathryn Jimenez was in custody when Oscar Jr.'s funeral took place Sept. 29. She didn't hear the plea of a longtime family friend.
"Listen carefully to the message," Olessia Silva said at the service. "To all the mothers in this world who may find themselves in a difficult situation or harmful relationship: know that there is always, always someone willing to help if you would just reach out."
Idaho Releases Yearly Report on Sexual
Abuse
By Suzanne Hobbs
NBC (KPVI) - January 24, 2008
http://www.kpvi.com/Global/story.asp?S=7770431
The Idaho Attorney General's yearly report on sexual abuse cases is out. It shows one disturbing fact that has not changed in all these years. It's that the abuser is almost always a person known and trusted by the victim and the victim's family, as with the Bonneville County case of Scott Wolfley, now admitting to molesting a young relative.
Of all 430 criminal cases filed in Idaho between July 2006 and June 2007 against adult and juvenile defendants, there were just three cases in which the defendant was a stranger to the victim.
Seventy-two percent were acquaintances, 8% were natural parents, 6% were step-parents and 9% were other relatives. Attorney General Lawrence Wasden says this yearly report reinforces that it is essential that parents know the people with whom their children spend time and remain vigilant that those in relationships of trust with their children do not seek to exploit that trust.
Governor Butch Otter says it's among the government's highest priorities to protect our children, and that's why this report is so important. Otter says it begins with gaining knowledge about the threats, and stopping the cycle of abuse from continuing to another generation.
Other key findings in the report are the number of cases filed from the previous year was down-- 26 fewer cases against adults and 13 fewer cases filed against juveniles. Forty-four percent of the victims of adult defendants were between the ages of 12 and 15 and 29% were 11 years old or younger.
Sixty-four percent of the victims of juvenile defendants were 11 years old or younger.
These are only the cases that are prosecuted. It's believed that many other child abuse cases go unreported each year, says Bruce Pickett with the Bonneville County Prosecutor's Office.
Bruce Pickett: "Communication is the key. Kids can be told at a very young age what's an appropriate touch and what's an inappropriate touch, and children need to be told that it's okay to talk about that with a parent - that if someone touches them, they can tell the parent, they will believe them and trust them. When a young person is molested sexually at a young age, it can affect them for the rest of their life."
The full report is available from the Idaho Attorney General at www2.state.id.us/ag.
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Last Updated: 1/25/2008
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