Artigo Revisado por pares

Hidden Perpetrators

1997; SAGE Publishing; Volume: 12; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1177/088626097012003009

ISSN

1552-6518

Autores

Mary Ellen Fromuth, VICTORIA E. CONN,

Tópico(s)

Child Abuse and Trauma

Resumo

The current study explored molestation committed by females during childhood and adolescence. Participants were 546 female college students recruited from the psychology research pool at a large southeastern university. Using a questionnaire approach, 22 women (4%) described at least one experience that met the criterion for sexually molesting a younger child. Although no offender viewed the experience as having a positive effect on the victim, only 3 of the 22 (14%) viewed what occurred as child sexual abuse. Few differences were found between perpetrators and nonperpetrators on background variables and psychological adjustment. Perpetrators, however, were more likely to have been sexually abused as children and to report having some sexual interest in children.

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