No full-text available
To read the full-text of this research,
you can request a copy directly from the authors.
An Internet Study of Men Sexually Attracted to Children: Sexual Attraction Patterns
Abstract
To our knowledge, this is the first large study of the attractions of child-attracted men recruited in any manner other than their being charged with legal offenses. We recruited 1,189 men from websites for adults attracted to children. Men in our sample were highly attracted to children, and they were much less attracted to adults, especially to adult men. However, men varied with respect to which combination of gender and age they found most attractive. Men in our sample were especially attracted to pubescent boys and prepubescent girls. Their self-reported attraction patterns closely tracked the age/gender gradient of sexual arousal established in prior research. Consistent with the gradient, men most attracted to prepubescent children were especially likely to have bisexual attractions to children. Pedohebephilia—attraction to sexually immature children—is best considered a collection of related if distinct sexual orientations, which vary in the particular combination of gender and sexual maturity that elicits greatest sexual attraction. Finally, our study reveals the potential power and efficiency of studying highly cooperative child-attracted men recruited via the Internet.
... Research has shown that men with sexual interest in children report a higher rate of bisexual attraction compared to men without sexual interest in children which may be explained by the fact that the child's body of a boy and a girl look more similar than the adult body of a man and a women and may therefore be equally attractive to individuals who have a sexual interest in children (Bailey, Hsu, & Bernhard, 2016). Gerwinn et al. (2018) investigated different samples of men, and those from non-forensic samples showed a higher education level than those who have a history of sexual offenses against children (i.e., forensic male samples) with or without a sexual interest in children. ...
... The motivation to change the sexual interest in children was highest among non-forensic men who were in treatment due to their sexual interest in children and was moderate high among participants who participated via an online platform that explicitly advocate against acting on sexual interest in children (Tozdan & Briken, 2015. Bailey et al. (2016) also investigated a non-forensic sample of men being sexually attracted to children ages 14 and younger recruited via the Internet (n = 1,189). Regarding the age of onset, participants recalled that they first realized their sexual interest in children at an average age of 14.24 years (SD = 5.36). ...
... Tozdan et al. (2020) also found that females who participated in their study via a website directed to individuals with sexual interest in children tended to more frequently indicate a homosexual or bisexual orientation than did participants from general websites. According to (Bailey et al., 2016), this may be explained because male and female infants/children have a more similar physical appearance than adult men and women and are therefore equally attractive for individuals who have a sexual interest in children. Research also demonstrated that samples of men with sexual interest in children show a higher rate of bisexual attraction compared to men without sexual interest in children (Bailey et al., 2016). ...
Little research has examined adult women’s sexual interest in children, particularly in non-forensic samples. We aimed to describe characteristics of women with sexual interest in children by recruiting 52 women (mean age: 33.2 years) who have a self-identified sexual interest in children under the age of 14 years into an anonymous online self-report study. Measures of interest referred to general characteristics (e.g., age, education level), general sexuality (e.g., sexual orientation, masturbation), and sexual interest in children (e.g., exclusivity, motivation to change). Results showed that women with sexual interest in children are similar to non-forensic samples of men with sexual interest in children in previous studies and rather differ from women from the general population regarding the investigated characteristics in this study. Our results clearly indicate that women with sexual interest in children need to be taken into account in future research and clinical practice. Treatment programs preventing sexual offenses against children or the consumption of abuse material need to explicitly address females as well.
... Although sexual attraction and behavior are emphasized as key diagnostic features in the DSM-5 (APA, 2013), nonsexual components of the interest are important to investigate, such as emotional attraction (Martijn, Babchishin, Pullman, & Seto, 2020). Lastly, age of onset and duration have been the focus of empirical research (e.g., Bailey, Hsu, & Bernhard, 2016;Grundmann et al., 2017;Tozdan & Briken, 2015 and emphasized as key components in the conceptualization of sexual interest in children (Seto, 2012). ...
... Sexual interest in children can be directed to interest in prepubescent children (pedophilia), pubescent children (hebephilia), or prepubescent and pubescent children (pedohebephilia). Research with males has generally found significant overlap between pedophilia and hebephilia and most males with sexual interest in children have pedohebephilia (Bailey et al., 2016;Stephens, Seto, Cantor, & Lalumi ere, 2019); however, to our knowledge this has not been examined in females. Given that females show a preference for same age or older partners (Antfolk, 2017;Trivers, 1972), it is possible that more females may endorse hebephilic interest than pedophilic interest. ...
... Based on this model, sexual interest will decrease the greater the difference between the most preferred sexual stimuli and the stimuli under examination (Blanchard et al., 2012;Seto, Lalumi ere, & Kuban, 1999). Support for the sexual response gradient model has been found in a community sample of males with sexual interest in children (Bailey et al., 2016). Based on the sexual response gradient, non-exclusive sexual interest in children would be expected to be more common than exclusive interest, which has been observed in males (Bailey et al., 2016;Martijn et al., 2020;Tozdan & Briken, 2015). ...
There are few empirical studies examining sexological features of sexual interest in children among females. A non-representative sample of 20 females and 208 males who self-identified as having a sexual interest in children completed an anonymous survey. The primary purpose of the present study was to examine sexological features of sexual interest in children among females. Most females reported interest in prepubescent and pubescent children and rated their interest in different age categories similarly. Most females reported an interest in boys. Females first experienced sexual attractions during childhood, but awareness of sexual interest in children occurred later in their adolescence.
... Men's sexual interests vary with respect to the biological sex (male or female) and degree of sexual maturation of other persons (Bailey, Hsu, & Bernhard, 2016b;Blanchard et al., 2012). Sexual maturation level can be graded according to the degree of physical maturity (e.g. ...
... Because of societal concern about childhood sexual abuse, a great deal of research has focused on men especially attracted to children. Research has generally supported the distinction between pedophiles (men primarily attracted to prepubescent children) and hebephiles (those attracted to pubescent children) (Bailey et al., 2016b;Blanchard et al., 2009Blanchard et al., , 2012Cantor & McPhail, 2015). Both pedophiles and hebephiles usually prefer children of one sex, although pedophiles have a greater tendency than hebephiles to be attracted to both male and female children. ...
... adult women and prepubescent males), many also have a capacity for sexual arousal and attraction to persons of other categories. Evidence for this erotic cross-responsiveness includes patterns of sexual offending (Seto, 2008), phallometric responses to erotic stimuli (Blanchard et al., 2012;Lykins et al., 2010), and self-reported attraction (Bailey et al., 2016b). Cross-category sexual responding is neither indiscriminate nor random, however. ...
Background
Men sexually interested in children of a specific combination of maturity and sex tend to show some lesser interest in other categories of persons. Patterns of men's sexual interest across erotic targets' categories of maturity and sex have both clinical and basic scientific implications.
Method
We examined the structure of men's sexual interest in adult, pubescent, and prepubescent males and females using multidimensional scaling (MDS) across four datasets, using three large samples and three indicators of sexual interest: phallometric response to erotic stimuli, sexual offense history, and self-reported sexual attraction. The samples were highly enriched for men sexually interested in children and men accused of sexual offenses.
Results
Results supported a two-dimensional MDS solution, with one dimension representing erotic targets' biological sex and the other dimension representing their sexual maturity. The dimension of sexual maturity placed adults and prepubescent children on opposite ends, and pubescent children intermediate. Differences between men's sexual interest in adults and prepubescent children of the same sex were similar in magnitude to the differences between their sexual interest in adult men and women. Sexual interest in adult men was no more associated with sexual interest in boys than sexual interest in adult women was associated with sexual interest in girls.
Conclusions
Erotic targets' sexual maturity and biological sex play important roles in men's preferences, which are predictive of sexual offending. The magnitude of men's preferences for prepubescent children v. adults of their preferred sex is large.
... Seto (2012Seto ( , 2017 defined sexual orientation by the principal aspects of age of onset, stability of attraction, sexual attraction, and romantic attraction. Support for these four aspects can be found in, for example, Bailey, Bernhard, and Hsu's (2016a) and Bailey, Hsu, and Bernhard's (2016b) internet survey of 1102 men with pedohebephilia. Their participants reported (1) an early age of onset, realizing their attraction to children at an average age of 14; (2) a persistent, stable attraction to children over time; (3) a strong sexual attraction to children (e.g., 25% reported a strong sexual attraction to prepubescent children, and 35% reported a strong sexual attraction to pubescent children; see also Grundmann, Krupp, Scherner, Amelung, & Beier, 2016;Schaefer et al., 2010;Tozdan & Briken, 2015); and (4) a majority (68%) indicated they had fallen in love with a child at least once in their lifetime. ...
... The range of exclusive pedophilic attraction differs across samples and settings. Estimates for exclusive pedophilic attraction range from 7% (Bailey et al., 2016b) to 34% (Beier et al., 2015). Men with hebephilia may be more likely to be non-exclusively attracted to children than men with pedophilia (Stephens, 2012). ...
... Attraction to polymorphic maturity categories (73%) and non-exclusivity (79%) of attraction to children were common in our sample. All of the participants indicated at least some attraction to age categories adjacent to their primary attraction, in line with the sexual gradient hypothesis (e.g., Seto, Lalumière, & Kurban, 1999) and previous work by Bailey et al. (2016b) and Stephens et al. (2017). ...
Few studies of pedophilia or hebephilia have included questions about romantic attraction. We conducted an anonymous online survey of 306 men who self-reported as sexually attracted to children. The majority (72%) of participants reported they had fallen in love with a child in their lifetime. Participants reported greater feelings of attachment to children than feelings of infatuation. Though sexual attraction and falling in love were strongly correlated, they were not synonymous. Participants who reported pedohebephilia (defined in this study as attraction to prepubescent and pubescent children) were more likely to have fallen in love with a child than participants who reported pedohebe-ephebophilia (defined as attraction to prepubescent, pubescent, and post-pubescent minors). Also, participants with an exclusive attraction to children were more likely to have fallen in love with a child than participants who were equally attracted to children and adults. The results of this study were consistent with the suggestion of Seto (2012) that pedohebephilia could be considered a form of sexual orientation for age, which includes both sexual and romantic attraction.
... Importantly, not all individuals who molest children meet DSM criteria for pedophilic disorder, and not all people with pedophilia abuse children. In fact, there are MAPs who refer to themselves as "virtuous pedophiles" and do not act on their attractions because they appreciate why sexual abuse is harmful to youngsters (Bailey et al. 2016;Mitchell and Galupo 2018). Important differences have been found between non-offending MAPs and those convicted of crimes against children (Mitchell and Galupo 2018). ...
... For others, early experiences can shape the development of their sexual template (Levenson et al. 2017). Most MAPs become aware of their atypical sexual interests during their teenage or young adult years (Bailey et al. 2016;Buckman et al. 2016). Many describe themselves as noticing that as they grew older, the age of the people they were attracted to did not increase. ...
... Shame, secrecy, and stigma prevent MAPs from finding formal and informal supports to help them navigate the complexities of minor-attraction and maintain an emotionally healthy life. Talking with family or friends about their concerns is often not perceived as a viable option, and in order to minimize risk of rejection, many turn to anonymous online communities (Bailey et al. 2016;Grady et al. 2018;Houtepen et al. 2016). Clients should be cautioned about websites that reinforce, justify, and validate sexually abusive behavior, or those that share child pornography (Holt et al. 2010). ...
Would you feel prepared if a client in your clinical practice shared that he was sexually attracted to children? Mental health professionals come in contact with these individuals primarily through the child welfare or criminal justice systems. But it is now increasingly evident that a population exists of non-offending minor-attracted persons (MAPs) who have never molested a child and have no intention of doing so. By becoming familiar with their unique treatment needs, clinicians can develop competence to provide effective, ethical, and compassionate services for this stigmatized and hard-to-reach population, with a dual focus on sexual abuse prevention and client well-being. This article will first describe what is known about pedophilia and minor-attraction. Next, the legal and ethical questions that therapists may ask in relation to this work will be explored. This paper will review obstacles to help-seeking identified by MAPs and discuss their treatment needs. Finally, recommendations will be offered for engaging MAPs in an emotionally safe and non-shaming therapeutic encounter. In this way, clinical social workers can contribute to advancing child sexual abuse prevention efforts.
... Among 75 men with self-identified sexual interest in children, our earlier study 11 found that self-perceived AOO ranged from 6 to 44 years with a mean value of 17 years. Bailey et al 12 recently published a study with a large sample of 1,189 men having sexual interest in prepubescent and/or pubescent children. The authors reported that "on average, participants recalled that they first realized their attraction to children ages 14 and younger at age 14.24 years (SD ¼ 5.36). ...
... And approximately half of all participants rejected that their sexual interest in children has so far been constant, again by choosing "do not agree at all" or "hardly agree." These results may speak against the hypothesis that pedophilia and hebephilia are relatively stable over time (eg, Seto, 6 Grundmann et al, 33 and Bailey et al 12 ). These results support the hypothesis that sexual interest in children can be relatively stable or flexible, probably depending on factors specific to the affected individual, his or her environment, and current situational factors. ...
... We could therefore not detect an onset that was not yet accessible to consciousness (eg, when individuals at the start suppressed their attraction to children). In addition, it might be that our AOO item rather assesses the age at which participants became aware that their sexual attraction is different to others around them (refer to Bailey et al 12 ). This would be the age at which participants consciously realized that they have sexual interest in children. ...
Introduction
Current discussions in the field of sex research concern the age at which sexual interest in children occurred or awareness emerged.
Aim
To investigate the age of onset (AOO) and its correlates in men with sexual interest in children.
Methods
Using 2 samples (study 1, patients from an outpatient treatment center, n = 26; study 2, an online survey using 3 recruitment paths, n = 94), we assessed self-reported AOO of sexual interest in children, its flexibility, its exclusiveness, and individuals’ motivation to change it. We further examined the interrelation between these variables.
Main Outcome Measure
AOO as the self-reported age at which participants retrospectively felt sexually attracted to children for the first time.
Results
We found broad ranges in AOO (study 1: mean 20.0 ± 10.7; study 2: mean 17.0 ± 8.7), flexibility, and exclusiveness (in studies 1 and 2, 7.7% and 22.3%, respectively, reported that their sexual interest is exclusively in children). The earlier participants felt sexually attracted to children for the first time, the more they were attracted exclusively in children and the less they perceived it to be flexible. Participants who reported rather exclusive sexual interest in children were less likely to perceive it as flexible. The more participants reported on flexibility, the more they were motivated to change it. The earlier participants of study 2 felt sexually attracted to children for the first time, the less they were motivated to change.
Clinical Implications
The variety of our results indicates the contradiction of overall rules for individuals with sexual interest in children.
Strength & Limitations
We included individuals with sexual interest in children from different contexts (eg, forensic vs non-forensic). Our results are in line with previous findings. However, both studies included rather small samples, limiting generalizability. There is not yet consent about how to operationalize AOO.
Conclusion
We recommend a differentiated perspective on individuals with sexual interest in children and on different forms of pedophilia in the diagnostic construct.
Tozdan S, Briken P. Age of Onset and Its Correlates in Men with Sexual Interest in Children.Sex Med 2019;7:61–71.
... A number of authors have previously divided risk factors for pedophilic behavior into motivational traits, those that might contribute to the pedophilic attraction, and disinhibiting traits, those that might facilitate illegal behavior. [1][2][3][4][5] We believe this distinction offers a useful heuristic, as it can help identify those risk factors that are most pertinent to public safety and therefore of highest priority as therapeutic targets. With a few exceptions, however (eg, Bailey et al 1 ), the literature on pedophilia has been restricted to subjects who have engaged in illegal pedophilic behavior and subsequently entered the criminal justice system. ...
... 29 Although we could not find studies specifically comparing acting and nonacting MAPs on the propensity toward cognitive distortions, 1 study found that the 2 groups held comparably positive attitudes toward adult-child sexual activity. 1 In addition, Webb et al 32 did not find any differences between Internet sex offenders and child molesters on the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory-III (MCMI-III), 33 which includes measures of personality traits related to impulsivity, propensity toward cognitive distortions, and socially inhibited personality traits. ...
... [6][7][8]22 Contrary to our hypotheses, forensic MAPs were more likely to be 13 or younger at first sexual contact than MAP nonactors, had a greater age difference with first partner at first sexual contact, and were more likely to report sexual advances from adults in childhood. These findings are consistent with other studies that have compared MAPs who have and have not sexually engaged with children, 1,30,49 although they are inconsistent with other studies. 31 This suggests that CSA plays a contributory role in both pedophilic behavior and attraction. ...
Objective:
Comparison of pedophilic individuals who do and do not refrain from sexually engaging with children may offer critically important information regarding the differential contributors to pedophilic attraction versus behavior. This study compared 5 traits that are potentially contributory to pedophilic attraction or behavior in both minor-attracted persons (MAPs) who refrain from sexually engaging with minors (nonacting MAPs) and those who have acted on pedophilic attractions and subsequently entered the criminal justice system (forensic MAPs).
Methods:
Subjects included 195 nonacting MAPs, 50 forensic MAPs, and 60 healthy controls. Data on nonacting MAPs were drawn from an online survey, and data on the other 2 groups were based on prior in-person evaluations. Measures included the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory-II (MCMI-II), Barratt Impulsiveness Scale (BIS-11), the MAP Questionnaire, and the Sexual History Questionnaire (SHQ).
Results:
Both MAP groups scored higher than healthy controls on the domains of socially inhibited personality traits, propensity toward cognitive distortions, and subjects' own childhood sexual abuse (CSA). Forensic MAPs scored higher than nonacting MAPs on the CSA domain, but the 2 MAP groups differed little on the other 2 domains. Forensic MAPs also scored higher than the other 2 groups on the antisocial domain, whereas nonacting MAPs did not differ from controls on this measure. Nonacting MAPs scored higher than controls on impulsivity.
Conclusions:
Antisocial personality traits may be a primary driver of pedophilic behavior that is unrelated to pedophilic attraction. Socially inhibited personality traits and propensity toward cognitive distortions are associated with pedophilic attraction, although the direction of causation is not clear. CSA seems to increase the risk of both attraction and behavior.
... Accordingly, research has tried to understand what makes an individual cross over in their sexual offending patterns. Victims' age crossover may be partially explained by the fact that, for some men, strong attraction to adults can coexist with a strong attraction to children, with the inverse being true as well, although it is more common for men to be attracted to adjacent age categories/levels of maturity (Bailey, Hsu, & Bernhard, 2016). An investigation conducted by Michaud and Proulx (2009) found that crossover offenders present less exclusive phallometric profiles than rapists or child molesters (i.e., they were sexually attracted to scenes that involved both consensual and nonconsensual sex with adult females, as well as to prepubescent females). ...
... Regarding gender crossover, it appears that sexual attraction may be more fluid for those who are especially attracted to prepubescent children (Bailey et al., 2016). A study of 362 sex offenders in the United States (Levenson, Becker, & Morin, 2008) indicated that those with preschool-aged (⩽6 years old) victims were three times more likely to target both males and females, than those with older victims. ...
... When analyzing the age crossovers' choice of victims, we found that 75% of those were from adjacent age categories, which is a common occurrence (Bailey et al., 2016). Consequently, 25% of the age crossovers had victims of remote (e.g., prepubescent and adult) and broader (e.g., pubescent, postpubescent, and adult) age categories. ...
Sex offenders who cross over in victims’ age, gender and relationship usually have a greater number of victims, which is associated with sexual recidivism. This investigation aimed to examine the prevalence of crossover index offending in Portugal, and to explore the predictive ability of sociodemographic and criminological variables on this outcome. A retrospective sample of 247 male individuals incarcerated for sex offenses in a Portuguese prison was drawn from official records. From those offenders with multiple victims (n = 94), 48% had victims of different age categories, 10% had both gendered victims, and 12% had intrafamilial and extrafamilial victims. Comparative statistics and logistic regressions were able to identify variables that distinguished noncrossover and crossover offenders and that predicted crossover, respectively. While likely underestimates of the prevalence of victim crossover, these findings are compared to previous international studies and provide a better understanding of the phenomenon.
... For instance, some autopedophilic men are most sexually attracted to and thus sexually aroused by the fantasy of being girls aged 4-10 , and they may especially engage in behaviors to impersonate children of that particular gender-age category specifically. Furthermore, men sexually attracted to children, including those who are autopedophilic men, do not tend to be sexually attracted to babies (Bailey et al., 2016;. Few report sexual attraction to girls or boys 3 years old or younger, and thus even fewer report sexual arousal by the fantasy of being girls or boys 3 years old or younger. ...
... Only seven men with both sexual attraction to babies and sexual arousal by the fantasy of being a baby were found in the present sample. In a large non-clinical, non-forensic sample of men sexually attracted to children, sexual attraction to babies was also rarely endorsed, compared with attraction to children of any other age range (Bailey et al., 2016). Future research on the sexuality of AB/DLs may benefit from more careful assessment of possible alternative motivations for being AB/DLs, as well as alternative explanations for sexual motivation. ...
Adult baby/diaper lovers (AB/DLs) enjoy role-playing as babies and/or wearing diapers. They also engage in other related activities, such as urinating or defecating themselves and having an adult care for them. Previous surveys have revealed that AB/DLs commonly report sexual motivation, a finding that is corroborated by case reports in the psychiatric literature and some media interviews. The fact that AB/DLs change their appearance and behavior to become more like babies raises the possibility that they have an erotic target identity inversion (ETII). In ETIIs, a person’s external erotic target is inverted into the self, resulting in sexual arousal by the fantasy of being a member of the target class or by imitating one. If AB/DLs are sexually motivated by an ETII, they should experience both sexual attraction to babies and sexual arousal by the fantasy of being a baby. We surveyed 207 male AB/DLs recruited from the Internet about their sexual orientation, sexual motivation, and sexual interests for a primarily quantitative analysis. Consistent with past research, a substantial minority of participants reported non-heterosexual identities (42%), and a large majority reported some degree of sexual motivation for being AB/DLs (93%). Wearing diapers and urinating or defecating oneself were rated as especially sexual. Even though 40% of participants reported sexual arousal by the fantasy of being a baby, only 4% reported sexual attraction to babies. This pattern of results is contrary to predictions from the concept of ETIIs. Instead, participants indicated that physical or mental pain, humiliation, and an adult woman were important to their sexual fantasies of being a baby. Masochism appears to be a promising alternative to an ETII for explaining the sexual motivation of AB/DLs.
... Efebofil natomiast się od nich różni. W jednym z badań [18] większość mężczyzn odczuwających seksualny pociąg do nastolatek miała podobną inklinację do dorosłych kobiet, ale nie była zainteresowana dziećmi przed okresem pokwitania. ...
... Podobne wyniki na grupie 1189 mężczyzn rekrutujących się z portali adresowanych do dorosłych odczuwających pociąg do dzieci uzyskali inni badacze. Odkryli oni, że wielu mężczyzn odczuwających pociąg przede wszystkim do dzieci pociągają osoby w różnym wieku, ale tym słabiej, im bardziej obiekt jest oddalony od preferowanego wieku [18]. ...
The issue of sexual abuse of minors in the Catholic Church is widely discussed in the media. Nevertheless, the term ‛priest-pedophile' has been used inaccurately to identify perpetrators. There is very little research directly dealing with this group of offenders among Catholic clergy, and we do not yet have any theory that would adequately explain this type of behavior. Attempts to psychologically characterize priests who sexually abuse minors have brought limited success so far. The purpose of this article is to present the most important issues and clinical dilemmas related to the diagnosis and treatment of paraphilias among Catholic clergy, signifying similarities and differences between clergy and other perpetrators of sexual offenses against minors, present typology of sexual offenders among priests, and discuss the relationship of victims' gender with sexual orientation and celibacy of perpetrators. The author demonstrates that using the term ‛priest-pedophile' is not only misleading, but is sometimes used to deliberately mislead. On the one hand, to create a moral panic effect, suggesting that the Catholic clergy is at increased risk of this type of crime. On the other hand, indicating gender and age of the most of their victims, suggesting that people responsible for this kind of abuse among Catholic clergy are homosexual priests and thus select a scapegoat responsible for the problems of the Church institution. Słowa klucze: parafilie, duchowni katoliccy, wykorzystanie seksualne małoletnich
... and are committed to avoid acting on their sexual preference because they understand the many reasons why sexual abuse is harmful to youngsters (Mitchell & Galupo, 2016). Though not part of the official diagnostic taxonomy, the term "pedohebephilic" is used by some researchers and practitioners to describe sexual preference for prepubescent children and/or pubescent teens (Bailey, Hsu, & Bernhard, 2016;Kramer, 2011;Seto, 2017). Furthermore, some people are preferentially attracted to postpubescent teens ("barely legal"). ...
... The majority of MAPs report that they first noticed their atypical sexual preferences during adolescence, but over time, as they got older, the focus of their attractions did not change (Buckman et al., 2016;Levenson et al., 2017;Seto, 2012). Efforts to understand the spectrum of sexuality for persons self-identified as MAPs reveal that variation exists; some MAPs report an exclusive attraction to minors (not attracted to adults at all), while others have satisfactory sexual relationships with adults, and still others report sexual interest in adults of one gender and minors of the other (Bailey et al., 2016). ...
Sexual abuse prevention efforts should ideally include counseling for people who have attractions to children before they offend. Due to a variety of factors, many therapists do not wish to work with this population. The aim of this pilot project was to create, implement, and evaluate a short training workshop to help prepare clinical therapists ( n = 94) to respond ethically and effectively to individuals seeking counseling for pedophilic interests. Data were collected at four different clinical-therapy professional conferences over the course of 14 months. The pretest/posttest design asked questions about six specific areas of knowledge related to pedophilia, mandatory reporting, treatment needs, and goals for this difficult-to-reach population. In addition, six questions were asked about attitudes toward working with minor-attracted persons and capacity to build a therapeutic relationship. Some significant changes were detected in knowledge and attitudes about clients with pedophilia after receiving training about the topic, indicating increased willingness to work with this population and improved feelings of competence in providing services. Implications for prevention are discussed.
... MAPs are individuals who describe themselves as being attracted to children or teens and might be more commonly known as pedophiles or hebephiles, though not all MAPs will meet criteria for a pedophilic disorder (American Psychiatric Association, 2013;Seto, 2012). Furthermore, some scholars have considered paraphilic interests in minors to be a form of sexual orientation (Bailey, Hsu, & Bernhard, 2016;Cantor & McPhail, 2016;Seto, 2012;Seto, 2017). However, it is important to note that pedophilic disorder is currently considered a mental health diagnosis and not a criminal act; pedophilia as a psychological category is not the same as having committed a sexual offense representing a legal category. ...
... Furthermore, the majority recognize that although they have aged beyond adolescence, their attractions have not, and this sexual attraction remains stable over time (Buckman, Ruzicka, & Shields, 2016;Levenson, Willis, & Vicencio, 2017;Seto, 2012). For these reasons, a number of scholars have argued that pedophilia or hebephilia (attraction to pubescent teens) should be considered a sexual orientation (Bailey et al., 2016;Cantor & McPhail, 2016;Seto, 2012;Walker & Panfil, 2017). The minor-attraction can be exclusive (not attracted to adults at all) or nonexclusive, and some individuals have reported being attracted to adults of one gender and minors of the other (Levenson & Grady, 2018). ...
Minor-attracted persons (MAPs; N = 293; 154 completed all questions) responded to 10 open-ended questions that were designed to capture in their own words their experiences of seeking treatment. We conducted a qualitative analysis of their responses using grounded theory, which is designed to allow themes to emerge from their responses without preconceived notions or expectations. Using this method, we coded answers and then calculated the total number of times that each theme was cited across the entirety of the survey. The most prominent theme that participants cited in their responses was the experience and/or fear of stigma (n = 87). Stigma plays a significant role in their willingness to engage in the treatment process. Some participants noted their concerns about how some attractions to minors should be viewed as “normal” and is unfairly stigmatized (“normalizing”; n = 63). Other prominent themes included shame (n = 50), which focused on internal views of themselves as a “bad person”; a perceived lack of understanding by professionals about MAPs (n = 50); and the importance of building a community with other nonoffending MAPs (either in person or online; n = 45). In addition, other identified themes included fear of being judged (n = 31), statements that they had never acted on their attractions (n = 31), and a fear of being reported (n = 31). Implications for practice and policy are discussed.
... There are both aspects and arguments we definitively agree with and others we would like to discuss. McPhail (2018) initially refers to results on the AOO of sexual interest in children ranging from 14 to 18 years (e.g., Bailey, Hsu, & Bernhard, 2016;Bernard, 1985;Grundmann, Krupp, Scherner, Amelung, & Beier, 2016;Tozdan & Briken, 2015a). These results are supposed to support the assumption that pedophilia has a pubertal AOO comparable to the AOO of sexual orientations (i.e., homo-, hetero-or bisexuality), as postulated by Seto (2012). ...
... We expect McPhail to agree with us that being sexually attracted to children does surely not indicate that one has no sexual orientation. Researchers also cited by McPhail (2018) reported on asking individuals with sexual interest in children about their sexual orientation (Bailey et al., 2016). Furthermore, we are wondering what the difference is between sexual gender identity and sexual orientation identity. ...
... Such question wordings tend to result in a pubertal or adult onset being reported by pedohebephilic men. Bailey et al. (2016) attended somewhat to the complexity I am discussing, but they also asked about age of onset in a manner that likely results in an post-pubertal age of onset (e.g., "Participants reported the ages at which they first noticed being sexually attracted to children (ages 14 and younger)" [p. 979]). ...
... The process of developing one's sexual orientation identity tends to occur in adolescence and can continue until young adulthood. The available evidence with pedohebephilic men suggests sexual age identity development generally follows a similar timeline (Bernard, 1985;Bailey et al., 2016;Cash, 2016;Grundmann et al., 2016;Tozdan & Briken, 2015). ...
Recent scholarship has examined the age of onset of pedohebephilic interests. While the issue of when such sexual interests begins is important to understand the development of minor attraction, there are noteworthy problems in the literature. As a result, clear explication of a few inter-related issues relevant to the age of onset of pedohebephilic interests appears warranted. This Letter aims to outline and provide commentary on some of these issues and contribute a more nuanced understanding of age of onset for pedohebephilic men and women.
... We had to develop the survey ourselves because of the absence of a validated questionnaire that can explore these topics in CAPs. Although this is a limitation, it is not unique to our study, as many previous studies of CAPs have had to develop their own surveys and/or adapt well-established questionnaires for use with the population (e.g., Bailey et al., 2016;Moss et al., 2021;. ...
Social support for child-attracted persons (CAPs) may be important for increasing well-being, thereby reducing the risk of committing child sexual abuse. Unfortunately, in-person social support may be difficult to obtain because of stigma. CAPs may instead turn to online forums for people who are sexually attracted to children. The present study looks at the emotional, informational, and tangible support CAPs offered and received through online forums. We recruited 353 CAPs from Twitter and multiple online forums. The survey covered basic demographics, frequency of forum use, reasons for forum use, social support received or offered, helpfulness of forums, and their quality of offline support. Most CAPs said that they initially sought out forums to avoid feeling alone in their attraction; the quality of offline support was rated as moderate. Emotional support and informational support were the most frequently endorsed forms of social support. CAPs who visited more forums reported forums to be less helpful, which could reflect “forum shopping.” A Poisson regression predicting online support from quality of offline support and various demographic and forum use variables did not reveal any significant results. This is the first quantitative study to look at the benefits of forums for CAPs regarding specific types of social support. The authors consider if certain forums, in addition to professional help, could be part of a repertoire of resources for CAPs who may be struggling.
... As the ERICSO is not a diagnostic tool, the age ranges selected (under six years, 7 to 10 years, 11 to under 16 years) are based on the age of minimum sexual consent in Australia with separation to assist in informing treatment targets. These age ranges are consistent with definitions for paedophilia (pre-pubescent), hebephilia (early adolescence) and ephebophilia (mid-to-late adolescence)sexual preference categories used by some authors (Bailey et al., 2016). ...
Purpose
There are a limited number of risk assessment tools relevant to the internet child abuse material (I/CAM) offender cohort. The purpose of this paper is to introduce a new tool, the “Estimated Risk for Internet Child Sexual Offending” (ERICSO). The ERICSO has been developed to assist in the treatment and prevention of sexual crimes against children.
Design/methodology/approach
The ERICSO was developed through a multi-stage process including systematic review, survey of professionals and offender case study.
Findings
An empirically guided tool for estimating risk for I/CAM offenders, the ERICSO is composed of four domains. The Demographic domain questions provide information about the offender, while Collection domain questions address the content of the offender’s files. The Nature of Engagement domain considers the offender’s interaction with I/CAM, behavioural aspects and contact with children. The Social Aspect domain questions address the offender’s engagement with other I/CAM users. Finally, the assessor may use Structured Professional Judgement to provide additional information, and a summary of the offender’s relevant circumstances and a risk estimation.
Practical implications
The ERICSO provides guidance for the assessment of I/CAM offenders who may reoffend with online child sexual offences, and I/CAM offenders who may reoffend with contact child sexual offences.
Originality/value
Born from a history of generational attitudes towards rehabilitation and risk assessment, the launch of the ERICSO presents an exciting opportunity in the risk estimation of I/CAM offenders.
... Lastly, low response discrimination may reflect non-exclusive sexual interests, because some men are sexually interested in both children and adults. The concept of non-exclusivity has long been recognized in the diagnostic criteria for Pedophilic Disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (e.g., DSM-5-TR; American Psychiatric Association, 2022) and has been detected in studies of community men and women who self-identify as pedophilic (e.g., Bailey et al., 2016;Beier et al., 2015;Martijn et al., 2020;Stephens & McPhail, 2021). The findings from community samples are particularly relevant, because these participants would be less likely to be motivated to manipulate their responses, relative to forensic samples. ...
Phallometric assessment is used to assess men’s sexual interest in children and to assist in risk assessment and treatment planning. A common response pattern, especially when the assessment is conducted in a forensic context, is an indiscriminate pattern of penile responses: No sexual stimulus seems to produce a substantially higher response than another. This indiscriminate response profile could be the result of (1) faking good (in particular, reducing the responses to child stimuli); (2) floor or ceiling effects caused by low or high arousability, or (3) non-exclusivity (the individual is similarly sexually interested in both children and adults). In this study of 2,858 adult male patients who underwent volumetric phallometric assessment for sexual interest in children between 1995 and 2011, we tested these three possible explanations. Results showed support for each of the explanations, but the variance accounted for in response discrimination was quite small when considering each explanation (separately or when considered together). We discuss avenues for future research to better discern the causes of indiscriminate responding in phallometric assessment.
... Among individuals with multiple child victims, cross-over of victim age may be more common than cross-over with gender (e.g., up to half of individuals reported cross-over for age and a fifth for cross-over for gender; see Abel et al., 1988;Saramago et al., 2020;Sim & Proeve, 2010). Looking at this more specifically, cross-over with gender may be more common among individuals targeting younger children (Levenson et al., 2008), a finding supported in a large sample of men recruited on the internet who self-reported pedophilic/hebephilic preferences (see Bailey et al., 2016). The percentages of cross-over can differ based on sampling and research methods, including the source for data collection. ...
Accessing child sexual exploitation material (CSEM; child pornography in legal statutes) can indicate sexual interest in children. It logically follows then that the age and gender of the depicted children may reflect specific interests in those age/gender groups, and if so, may correspond to age and genders of any known contact offending victims. We had data on CSEM characteristics and child victims for 71 men convicted of CSEM offenses who also had contact sexual offenses against children; some had also sexually solicited children online. Sixty-four men had 134 prior or concurrent child victims, and 14 men reoffended directly against 17 children during follow-up. There were significant, positive associations (with moderate to large effect sizes) between age and gender of children depicted in CSEM and age and gender of child contact or solicitation victims. Examining future offending, though with only 14 recidivists, all men who sexually reoffended against a girl had more girl CSEM content, and all men who sexually reoffended against a boy had more boy CSEM content. Our results suggest that CSEM characteristics can reflect child preferences. This information can be relevant in clinical settings, police investigations, and community risk management, though it does not rule out interest in, or offending against, victims of other ages or gender. We discuss these findings in the context of other evidence regarding victim cross-over, and suggest future research.
... Owing to controversy over the latter of these categories , we use the broader MAP label to refer to individuals who have sexual attractions to infants, prepubescent children, and children who are in the early stages of puberty, due to the substantial self-reported and clinically observed overlap in these attraction patterns (Beier et al., 2009;Blanchard, 2010;Lievesley et al., 2020;Stephens et al., 2017aStephens et al., , b, 2018Stephens et al., , 2019. In our case, we do not necessarily equate MAPs with those who have primary or predominant sexual attractions to children, but instead this label includes anybody who experiences such attractions, owing to the often observed lack of exclusivity of sexual attractions to children among MAPs (Bailey et al., 2016;Eher et al., 2015;Martijn et al., 2020). ...
There is a desire and need among minor-attracted persons (MAPs) to access support within the community, and this often begins with an approach to healthcare providers working in general medical/mental health settings. However, little is known about the experiences of these non-specialist professionals in relation to their beliefs, knowledge, and decision-making processes when working with patients who disclose sexual attractions to children. Using an online survey, this study explored the knowledge, comfort, competence, and treatment willingness of 220 non-specialist healthcare providers when faced with patients who disclose sexual attractions to children. We investigated how often such disclosures were made, clinician stigma, treatment priorities, and professionals’ willingness to report MAPs to external agencies because of their sexual attractions. Some key differences were found when comparing primary medical vs. mental health professionals, including increased likelihood to view MAPs as dangerous, unable to control behaviors and that sexual attractions are an avoidable choice, in the former group. Both groups prioritized mental health treatment targets above controlling attractions and living with stigmatized attractions, although controlling or changing attractions were still relatively high priorities. Results indicated a need for further training, focusing on increasing comfort around working with MAPs, as this was associated with a greater willingness to work with this group. We identify current gaps in service provision for MAPs seeking professional support and discuss recommendations for professional training.
... Sam's realisation of the "age-stuntedness" of his homosexuality (i.e. that he was exclusively attracted to younger boys) did not come until he was 15 years old; which corresponds with existing research on the typical development of minor-attracted persons' (MAPs') sexual interests in children (B4UAct, 2011;Bailey et al., 2016). At this age, Sam committed a sexual offence against a young boy (aged 11 or 12), which he was convicted of as an adult in his twenties. ...
Research indicates that autistic individuals are no more likely to offend than anyone else in the general population. However, it has been suggested that when autistic individuals do offend, their offending behaviour can be contextualised by their autism. One of the most common forms of offending reported to be committed by autistic individuals are sexual offences, and research has outlined how autism can contribute to those offences. Additionally, recent research has also indicated that autistic prisoners may experience unique challenges and have specific support needs during their prison sentences, which potentially differ from their non-autistic peers. Despite this, little research has specifically explored how to work with, support and manage autistic individuals with sexual offence convictions (ISOCs) in prison-based interventions to address sexual offending.
This thesis details an exploratory sequential mixed method approach used to explore effective work practices with autistic ISOCs in prison-based interventions to address sexual offending. Specifically, this thesis explored the following research questions; 'How appropriate are current prison-based sexual offending interventions for autistic ISOCs?' And 'What is best practice when working with autistic ISOCs in prison-based sexual offending interventions?'. To answer these research questions, the thesis sought to: (i) identify challenges associated with prison-based sexual offending interventions for autistic ISOCs; (ii) identify beneficial features of prison-based sexual interventions for autistic ISOCs; and (iii) to generate evidence-based, practical recommendations on how to work with autistic ISOCs in prison-based sexual offending interventions.
This thesis is constructed of six chapters. Chapter 1 provides a broad introduction to the topic background and rationale of the thesis, concluding with the overarching research questions and aims. Chapter 2 provides a discussion of the methodological issues that were relevant to the empirical studies of the thesis, including a rationale for the mixed method design. Chapter 3 reports Study 1, which was a qualitative narrative exploration of the life stories of autistic ISOCs (N= 4). This study incorporated an inclusive, participatory autism research approach, and discusses how diversity and similarities in those life stories may be relevant for interventions. Chapter 4 reports Study 2, a multi-perspective qualitative study that utilised a phenomenologically informed thematic analysis to explore the issues surrounding working with autistic ISOCS in prison-based interventions to address sexual offending, from the perspectives of autistic ISOCs (N= 12) and staff (N= 13). Chapter 5 details Study 3, a quantitative study that sought to confirm qualitative findings reported in Chapter 4; relating to the relationships between autistic traits, the prison social climate, mental wellbeing and readiness to 6 engage with interventions in a sample of ISOCs serving prison sentences (N= 177). Finally, Chapter 6 provides a synthesis and general discussion of the collective findings from the empirical studies. Chapter 6 also details practical recommendations for working with autistic ISOCs in prison-based sexual offending interventions, directions for future research, highlights the original contributions of the thesis, considers broader limitations of the research, and offers a final conclusion.
... Some researchers (Blanchard, 2015;Seto, 2017) have recently argued that the meaning of sexual orientation can be extended to include other dimensions of sexual attraction besides gender, at least in men. For example, men vary in the extent to which they are attracted to sexually mature adults (teleiophilia) compared with prepubescent or pubescent children (pedohebephilia) (Bailey, Hsu, & Bernhard, 2016;Seto, 2012Seto, , 2017. It has been argued that important aspects of this dimension of sexual attraction--early onset, strong arousal by some but not all gender-age categories, and stability across time--are identical to the reasons why we refer to relative attraction to men versus women as sexual orientation. ...
Sexual orientation
is conventionally understood as relative attraction to men versus women. It has recently been argued that male sexual orientation in particular can be extended to include other dimensions of sexual attraction besides gender. One such dimension is sexual maturity, or relative attraction to children versus adults. A less familiar dimension is location, or relative attraction to other individuals versus sexual arousal by the fantasy of being one of those individuals. Erotic target identity inversions (ETIIs)
refer to some men’s sexual arousal by the fantasy of being the same kinds of individuals to whom they are sexually attracted. Thus, ETIIs reflect the movement from external attraction to internal attraction on the dimension of location. ETIIs can motivate men to change their appearance and behavior to become more like the individuals to whom they are sexually attracted. ETIIs also provide a compelling theoretical explanation for otherwise puzzling phenomena, such as cross-dressing among heterosexual men, desire for limb amputation, and the furry phenomenon. Despite its scientific and clinical value, the concept of ETIIs has been underappreciated and understudied. This chapter reviews the ETIIs that have been previously identified in the literature, addresses important issues related to ETIIs, discusses the causes and development of ETIIs, and proposes future directions for research.KeywordsErotic target identity inversionAutogynephiliaApotemnophiliaAutopedophiliaParaphiliaSexual orientation
... Visions of Alice (https://alicelovers.net), GirlChat (https://www.annabelleigh.net), and BoyChat (https://www.boychat.org). Previous research studies on individuals who are sexually attracted to children in the community have been successful utilizing this recruitment strategy (e.g., Bailey et al., 2016aBailey et al., , 2016bCacciatori, 2017;Lievesley et al., 2020). ...
There is a need for community treatment programs for people who are sexually attracted to children, but individuals report difficulty accessing services. Individuals who are sexually attracted to children (n = 293) completed an online anonymous survey that revealed a significant positive association between maladaptive coping and two factors of the treatment motivation measures. The association between maladaptive coping and treatment motivation was attenuated at higher levels of ego dystonic distress/aversion. Results highlight the importance of targeting stigma toward those who are sexually attracted to children to increase treatment seeking behavior.
... Populations of pedophilic and hebephilic individuals are increasingly reachable through online forums that are explicitly anti-offending (e.g., VirPed.org) or more ambiguous in their message (e.g., GirlChat, BoyChat.org). Using forums, researchers have been able to recruit large samples of individuals with a sexual interest to take part in quantitative research (e.g., Bailey et al., 2016) or in smaller numbers for qualitative or mixed designs (e.g., Mitchell & Galupo, 2018). However, there are a number of research questions and designs that are less suitable to participant recruitment through these forums. ...
This study examined the feasibility of using crowdsourcing to recruit men who self-report sexual interest in children or sexually problematic behavior involving children. Crowdsourcing refers to the use of the internet to reach a large number of people to complete a specific task. A nonrepresentative sample of men ( N = 997) participated in a brief self-report survey examining age of attraction, sexual interest in children, proclivity toward sexual offenses involving children, and history of sexual offending. Almost a quarter of the sample (23.1%) indicated some degree of sexual interest in children, propensity to sexually offend against children, and/or actual offending behavior. We present our data broken down by type of interest or behavior and examine the frequency of these outcomes. Findings are likely to be of value to those considering the viability of crowdsourcing to overcome the limitations or challenges of face-to-face research on stigmatizing interests and behaviors. Findings also contribute to estimating prevalence of self-reported sexual interest in children, and sexual offending behavior toward children, across different countries.
... This would also control for potential confounds due to participants who are sexually attracted to both children and adults (pedo-teleiophilic). Prevalence estimates ranging from 7 to 34% show that an exclusive sexual attraction toward children is rather rare (Bailey, Hsu, & Bernhard, 2016;Beier et al., 2015). ...
... Paedophilia itself however seems fairly stable. Large-scale surveys suggest that the onset occurs during puberty and then persists (Bailey, Hsu & Bernhard, 2016b;Grundmann, Krupp, Scherner, Amelung, & Beier, 2016). Where change has been reported using phallometric testing (Müller et al. 2014), it has been the subject of heavy criticism (Cantor, 2015;Bailey, 2015;Lalumière, 2015). ...
... One of the most widely studied paraphilias is paedophilia (sexual interest in prepubescent children) which, although considered illegal in most jurisdictions, is also seen in the general population. More recently there has been a call to move away from the narrow definition provided by categorical models such as DSM to terminology such as paedo-hebephilia (Bailey et al. 2016) or minor-attracted persons (Stevens and Wood 2019). Both include a sexual attraction to age groups other than only prepubescent children. ...
Definitions of sexual deviance have changed over time and the more recent use of paraphilia and paraphilic disorder in the development of DSM‑5 has been met with criticism. The larger context of this discussion lies in the use of sexually explicit media (SEM), whether this can be seen as normative rather than deviant, and its relationship with sexual violence. The use of sexual media depicting children (CSEM) has been seen as a good diagnostic indicator of paedophilia, but clearly not all people who possess CSEM can be classified as paedophiles. However, possession and trading of CSEM may provide evidence of specific sexual interests and there is some evidence to suggest that there may be a potential homology between CSEM possession, victim selection and offending behaviour. The article explores how sexual interest in children is evidenced and the challenges in understanding the prevalence of these activities both in the community as well as forensic and clinical samples.
... A history of childhood sexual abuse was significantly associated with child sexual offending (child pornography and sexual contact) but not with the degree of attraction to children. 15 Cohen et al 16 compared male offenders with paedophilia with a demographically similar control group. 60% of the male pedophiles reported adult sexual advances as a child compared with 4% of the control subjects. ...
Background:
Adverse childhood events have a lasting impact on mental health. Studies on patients with pedophilia focus on traumatic events as sexual abuse in their childhood, in which further childhood maltreatment is rarely described.
Aim:
In addition to previous studies on patients with pedophilia that focus on traumatic events as sexual abuse, we further investigate different types of childhood maltreatment.
Methods:
We compared 3 samples using the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire: patients with pedophilia, psychotherapy outpatients, and general population (GP). Descriptive analyses were conducted for prevalence rates. To assess statistical differences between the samples concerning retrospective childhood trauma, we conducted t-tests and a multivariate analysis of variance. Binary logistic regression analyses were conducted to identify predictors of childhood maltreatment.
Outcomes:
Emotional and sexual abuse was associated with pedophilic sexual preference.
Results:
Significant differences of experienced childhood maltreatment were found between the samples with the patients with pedophilia reporting the highest rates. Psychotherapy outpatients reported more childhood maltreatment than the GP except for sexual abuse.
Clinical implications:
Our results speak to a burdened and stressful childhood of patients with pedophilia; a fantasized, sexualized world in an abusive and neglecting childhood may function as a refuge and lead to "psychic withdrawal."
Strengths & limitations:
This is the first study comparing a small sample of patients with pedophilia with psychotherapy outpatients and a representative sample of the GP. The use of an established and standardized questionnaire of childhood maltreatment represents a strength. However, the questionnaire's exclusive focus on abuse and neglect represents a limitation as it fails to examine other sources of adverse childhood experiences (eg, intrafamily relationships or loss of a parent).
Conclusion:
A better understanding can help establish more effective treatment and prevention programs for patients with pedophilia. Marx CM, Tibubos AN, Brähler E, et al. Experienced Childhood Maltreatment in a Sample of Pedophiles: Comparisons With Patients of a Psychosomatic Outpatient Clinic and the General Population. J Sex Med 2020;XX:XXX-XXX.
... Due to the anonymous nature of the forum researchers were unable to mediate the impact of this by excluding those who have offended. The potential inclusion of offending MAPs may have impacted the themes identified as emerging research identifies disparities between these populations (Bailey, Hsu, & Bernhard, 2016). For example, offending MAPs report stronger attraction to children, possibly implicating differences in self-control between the populations (Cohen et al., 2018). ...
‘Non-offending pedophiles’ or ‘minor attracted persons’ are individuals who suppress an attraction to children. Previous analyses of this population’s mental illness employed overt self-report methods, limited by social desirability. Additionally, studies assessing the coping mechanisms employed to remain offense-free are underpowered; understanding of these would facilitate the rehabilitation of prior offenders. A thematic analysis of coping mechanisms and mental illness was conducted on 5,210 posts on the ‘Virtuous Pedophiles’ forum. Four themes emerged for coping mechanisms: Managing risk and attraction to children, Managing mood, Managing preferences prosocially and Friends, family and relationships, with 13 subthemes. Five themes emerged for mental ill-health, including: Addiction, Anxiety, Depression, Self-hatred/Self-harm/Suicide and Other. Self-hatred/Self-harm/Suicide accounted for almost a third of discussed mental ill-health. These results highlight the severity of mental ill-health amongst this population and the coping mechanisms employed to remain offense-free.
... Past findings on the personality profiles of people with pedohebephilia (i.e., a sexual interest directed at sexually immature children before or in the early stages of puberty, Bailey, Hsu, & Bernhard, 2016) seem to coalesce around the notion that these interests are associated with increased introversion, neuroticism, and, in some studies, impulsivity or decreased conscientiousness (Tenbergen et al., 2015), which is sometimes interpreted as indicating "a causal relationship between abnormal brain functioning and pedophilia" (Kruger & Schiffer, 2001, p. 1651. In most cases, these observations are based on samples of sexual offenders against children (Cohen et al., 2002;Kruger & Schiffer, 2011;Langevin, Paitich, Freeman, Mann, & Handy, 1978). ...
Men with a sexual interest in children or adolescents have been described as less extraverted, conscientious, and emotionally stable than controls. Yet, such studies have mostly been conducted in forensic institutions. To test whether such findings generalize to community samples, we assessed personality profiles of 123 German-speaking men with and 89 men without pedohebephilia online, using the Big Five Inventory-25. Our results indicate that men with pedophilia or hebephilia are less emotionally stable and extraverted but more conscientious than controls. We discuss study limitations and potential causes for differences in personality among community samples of men with and without pedohebephilia.
... Sexual orientation appears to develop (or reach one's consciousness retrospectively) before or at the onset of puberty, around the age of 10 (e.g., Hamer, Hu, Magnuson, Hu, & Pattatucci, 1993;McClintock & Herdt, 1996;Pattatucci & Hamer, 1995;Savin-Williams, 1995;Timiras, 1972). As reported in Tozdan and Briken (2015) and more recently (Bailey, Hsu, & Bernhard, 2016;Grundmann et al., 2016;Tozdan & Briken, 2018b), reports on the AOO of sexual interest in children are definitely not around the age of 10. This was the important aspect for us, and again, we were not claiming that there are no individuals who have sexual interest in children very early in life. ...
... While in recent years it has been debated whether or not so-called 'adultchild sex' is at all harmful to the children (see for example Bailey, Hsu, & Bernhard, 2016;Jahnke, Schmitt & Malon, 2017), neurobiological research allows reliable inferences of the harmfulness of CSA (Guggisberg, 2017). In the following various impacts of intrafamilial CSA victimisation will be briefly examined. ...
Violence against women across their life span has been recognised as a serious problem in contemporary society. This chapter identifies forms of violence against women and girls with focus on the family home. It discusses childhood victimisation and the increased risk for later intimate partner violence, adolescent violence against the mother, and abuse in older age. The issue of trauma-related distress is examined in relation to physical and mental health, social and emotional functioning and its contribution to increased vulnerability for subsequent victimisation. It argues that professionals working with children and women could assist in preventative efforts by understanding the way in which exposure to violence by a trusted family member can interfere with adjustment and the development of emotional self-regulation. Early intervention may assist in treating the impact of victimisation. The chapter concludes that indentifying vulnerable and victimised females of any age, and providing effective intervention therapies along with generalised prevention programs, may demonstrate intergenerational disruption of harmful outcomes of violence against women and girls in the family home.
... Thus, it can be concluded that green satisfaction and green trust mediated the effect of green image on consumers' word-of-mouth intention. The results were in line with the research of Mart?nez (2015), Bailey et al. (2016), andChen et al. (2015) who all highlighted the importance of green satisfaction and green trust in examining consumer response to environmental issues. ...
Online support communities are gaining attention among child-attracted persons (CAPs). Though research has largely focused on the negative consequences these environments create for potential offending, they may also provide a beneficial alternative to more formal treatment settings. To assess the utility for clinical and therapeutic purposes, this analysis focused on subcultural dynamics to examine self-reported wellbeing outcomes of participation in a Dutch forum for CAPs. A total of 15 semi-structured interviews were conducted with moderators, members and mental health professionals involved in the community. Thematic analyses demonstrated that by means of informal social control, bonds of trust and social relational education, the network aims to regulate the behavior and enhance the wellbeing of its marginalized participants. Key outcomes include a decreased sense of loneliness and better coping with stigma, to the point that participants experience less suicidal thoughts. Association with prosocial peers also helps to set moral boundaries regarding behavior towards children, although we cannot fully rule out potential adverse influences. Online support networks offer a stepping stone to professional care that fits individual needs of CAPs, while also providing an informal environment that overcomes limitations of physical therapy and that extents principles of existing prevention and desistance approaches.
Emerging research has examined the experiences of individuals who are sexually attracted to children. This study collected both quantitative and qualitative data from individuals with self-identified pedohebephilic attractions (n = 116). Several analyses were used to assess whether the sample characteristics followed Seto’s (2012) conceptual outline of pedophilia as an orientation to sexual maturity. The three developmental characteristics of gender-based sexual orientation were explored using survey and interview data. Overlapping patterns with relation to the age of onset, expressions of both sexual and romantic attractions, and stability of such attraction over time were found. As noted by researchers and clinicians in this area, there are clear clinical implications associated with a shift in the conceptualization of sexual attraction to children. Such etiological conceptualizations are often poorly understood and/or conflated with sociocultural understandings and reactions. Despite resistance to such conceptualizations, the findings indicate that orientation to sexual maturity closely mirrors the developmental trajectory of gender sexual orientation, as outlined in Seto’s seminal paper.
Treatment for Minor Attracted Persons is inadequate and difficult to access. This qualitative study examined community-based MAPs' responses to narrative questions about their experiences and what they want society to understand, using an iterative thematic analysis. Notable responses from the participants included: 1) sexual attraction does not equal action; 2) minor attraction is immutable; 3) stigma leads to psychological burden; 4) therapy should aim to reduce distress, not change sexual feelings; and 5) sexual behavior can be controlled and remain within legal parameters. Further understanding of MAPs' experiences is key for developing more efficacious treatment modalities to help them live meaningful lives without endangering children.
In order to treat individuals with pedophilia ¹ who are at risk of committing offenses, disclosure of the attraction must first take place. The aim of this study was to understand processes of initial recognition of pedophilic attraction, disclosure, and help-seeking. We conducted a qualitative content analysis of online posts from self-identified individuals with pedophilia, finding four categories: (1) Awareness and Initial Self-View (with emotions including denial, shame, and fear), (2) Disclosure (typically made to family, friends, or therapists, but also done online in an anonymous way), (3) People’s Reactions to Disclosure (ranging from rejection to support), and (4) Current Self-View (including minimization, distortions, despair, resignation, and non-offending/anti-contact commitment). Our findings highlight the internal process experienced by individuals with pedophilia when first recognizing their attraction to minors, what is involved in disclosure, the importance of others’ reactions after disclosure, and the factors that can reinforce a non-offending commitment. Clinical and social implications are discussed.
Pedofilie is een maatschappelijk gevoelig thema, waarover verschillende misvattingen en stigma’s circuleren. Ook binnen de klinische praktijk blijft het een taboeonderwerp. Veel te vaak wordt pedofilie gelijkgesteld met kindermisbruik. Onderzoek toont echter aan dat heel wat mensen seksuele interesses voor minderjarigen ervaren zonder tot seksueel kindermisbruik over te gaan. De negatieve opvattingen hebben niet alleen impact op het sociale leven en het psychosociaal welzijn van personen met een seksuele voorkeur voor minderjarigen ̶ in het Engels minor-attracted persons (MAPs) genoemd ̶ , het heeft ook invloed op het hulpzoekend gedrag van deze personen. De huidige studie beoogt meer inzicht te verwerven in het hulpzoekend gedrag van MAPs. Uit de resultaten blijkt dat slechts een minderheid hulp heeft gezocht. Vooral formele hulpbronnen of hulp door professionals lijken van belang in hun zoektocht naar hulp, maar de drempel ernaartoe blijft groot. Niet alleen duidelijkheid rond de toegang en de beschikbaarheid van formele hulpbronnen zijn noodzakelijk om de zoektocht naar gepaste hulp te faciliteren, ook de houding en attitude van hulpverleners ten aanzien van MAPs spelen een belangrijke rol. In deze bijdrage wordt besproken hoe bestaande initiatieven hier reeds op anticiperen, ook worden aanbevelingen geformuleerd over de wijze waarop het bestaande hulpaanbod beter kan aansluiten bij de noden van MAPs.
This thesis centres around the relationship between indecent images of children (IIOC) offending and suicide, and the impact of these issues on the partners of IIOC offenders. Part I is a conceptual introduction exploring IIOC offender suicide as a phenomenon and considering how several prominent theories of suicide may account for suicide in this population. Part II documents an empirical study investigating women’s experiences of their male partners being arrested for IIOC offences and subsequently developing suicidal ideation, or attempting or committing suicide. This utilised interpretative phenomenological analysis to analyse interview data from six participants, with three superordinate themes identified; A Living Nightmare, Something Needs to Change, and Adjustment & Adaptation. Part III of this thesis is a critical appraisal of the research process, focusing specifically on some key considerations when conducting research with partners of IIOC offenders.
In an online survey of 274 self-identified child-attracted persons (CAPs), we examined the attraction ratings given to sets of 9 physical and 12 psychological features of children, and asked CAPs to identify additional features that were not listed. We also examined the relationships between these attraction ratings and attraction to children dimensions (age mono-/polymorphism, exclusivity of attraction to children, and gender attraction), history of falling in love with a child, and detected sexual offending history. There was relatively little differentiation across physical features and psychological features; all averages were approximately 4 or higher on a 5-point scale. Attraction ratings were mostly weakly and inconsistently related to our other study variables. The exception was that CAPs who had fallen in love with a child rated 11 out of 12 psychological features as more attractive than CAPs who had not fallen in love with a child, with small to moderate effect sizes. These two groups did not differ in ratings for physical features. Our qualitative content analysis of participant-suggested features revealed six physical themes (inter alia, face and head, children’s bodies) and five psychological themes (inter alia, personality, harmlessness) that were important to CAPs’ attraction to children.
Background
Despite debates on what should constitute sexual interest in children in terms of definition and diagnostic criteria and its strong association with individuals who commit sexual offences against children, research in this area has shown that sexual interest in children is also commonly seen in the general population. Studies in this field have investigated its prevalence and its correlates. However, most research on this topic has focused on men and most particularly sex offender populations. When investigating the general population, again the vast majority of studies used male samples and students.
Objective
This systematic review aimed to critically evaluate previous research on the prevalence of sexual interest in children across populations and to examine its correlates.
Methods
A search of relevant databases was conducted as well as a hand search of selected journals to identify eligible papers. Studies meeting the inclusion criteria had their data extracted and were assessed for risk of bias, with a second rater to establish inter-rater reliability.
Results
A total of 30 studies were reviewed and results indicated a mean prevalence rate of sexual interest in children between 2 %–24 %. Findings also indicated correlates such as the presence of mental health problems and adverse childhood experiences. Most studies showed poor external validity, with the majority of them scoring high on risk of bias.
Conclusion
Overall, the findings indicate inconsistencies in terms of methodology and definition/diagnostic criteria of sexual interest in children. Further research in this area using recommended methodology to avoid biases is recommended.
On the online forum Virtuous Paedophiles, experiences of being sexually attracted to children are discussed based on the belief that ‘adult-child sex’ is wrong. Having explored the forum’s culture of support, advice, and negotiations, we find that the stigmatised paedophile character limits both the understanding of being a paedophile and the ability to remain virtuous. Additionally, ideas about the paedophile character allow the formation of a counter discourse: the virtuous paedophile character. We argue that the justifications used in the forum differ from those in pro-contact communities and that the forum can help paedophiles be offense-free.
Existing literature suggests that a variety of biopsychosocial factors may be related to sexual attraction to children, but why some individuals successfully refrain from offending remains largely unknown. Emerging research has examined the experiences of child-attracted persons. Child attracted person is a modified version of the self-referential term minor-attracted person, used to describe an individual who is sexually attracted to individuals under the legal age of consent, which varies by legal system. This research program used a multimethod approach to explore heterogeneity among child-attracted persons. First, quantitative data were collected from 116 self-identified child-attracted persons and 208 university students. Participants completed an online survey of 11 self-report measures, assessing a variety of factors that have been found to be related to sexual offending, such as emotional congruence, sexual narcissism, negative affect scales, and personality. Comparative analyses indicated many similarities between the samples, although there were several key differences. A latent profile analysis indicated that a four-profile model best fit the data. The child-attracted profiles were labelled socially energized, psychologically distressed, interpersonally problematic, and childhood focused. Although the profiles differed with respect to key resiliency factors, they did not differ in terms of most demographic characteristics. Second, qualitative data were collected from 23 self-identified child-attracted persons in the form of semi-structured interviews. Thematic analysis of the qualitative data uncovered several key themes across the interviews, including understanding attraction to children as a sexual orientation; how such attractions are viewed and treated societally; engagement in sexuality; mental health concerns and associated therapy services; and the overall impact of the attraction. Finally, several measures related to attraction to children were modified and analyzed for statistical reliability. Taken together, the findings of this research program support the presence of heterogeneity among the child-attracted community. This supports the necessity to develop assessment and treatment options that incorporate such differences. Further, the findings of the research program, and other emerging research exploring sexual attraction to children, suggest serious negative mental health outcomes associated with identifying as attracted to children and with the associated stigma, often beginning in adolescence. These findings underscore the need to continue to pursue research in this area and develop further understandings of sexual attraction to children and related outcomes.
The concept of karma (which means that the actions in this birth and previous births will determine the current fate) is exercised as a tool with some explanatory power to help promote understanding about a range of social problems in the South Asian culture. Through an exploration of indepth telephonic interviews conducted with a convenience sample of 20 South Asian women (originally from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Maldives and Bhutan) in the United States, this chapter discusses these South Asian women’s experiences of domestic violence and helpseeking practices, in the context of the concept of karma as a unit of analysis. This study found that due to belief in karma (fate/destiny), South Asian women tend to endure violence for longer periods of their lives and therefore are reluctant to seek help. Additionally, the chapter highlights the meanings, events, processes and structures in the lives of South Asian women respondents living in the United States. Within the framework of discussion on karma and domestic violence (DV), the chapter emphasizes the need to offer culturally sensitive services and encourage the agency personnel to understand the ways South Asian women have coped on their own and within their own belief systems.
In this chapter, Christiansen and Martinez-Dettamanti compliment the previous chapter by providing an applied overview of actual prevention work and practices over the years. This includes the history and development of well-known prevention initiatives to date, such as Prevention Project Dunkelfeld and the Stop It Now! campaign. These initiatives encompass prevention education, clinical and crisis interventions, support groups, and online forums for individuals with risky or problematic sexual behaviour. Along with this, an introduction to and history of the non-offending paedophile population is provided. The development of organisations and communities available to support such individuals, both online and in person, is also explored.
Individuals with a sexual interest in children who have not committed a sexual offence are a client population that are currently underserved by psychologists. In the context of accessing and providing mental health services, mandatory reporting laws represent a key issue for clients and psychologists. For clients, mandatory reporting requirements creates a double-bind: they wish to access psychotherapy for a myriad of psychological concerns, yet they fear the implications of psychologists’ mandated reporting requirements if they disclose their sexual interest. Psychologists treating non-offending clients with sexual interests in children face several overlapping and competing ethical and legal obligations created by mandatory reporting laws. To examine these complexities, the present paper reviews and discusses legislation in Canada, complaints to provincial professional colleges, and case law related to mandatory reporting requirements. We additionally review principles and standards in the Canadian Psychological Association’s Code of Ethics (4th edition) to inform service provision with these clients. Recommendations for practice are provided based on this discussion and practice case vignettes are given to facilitate ethical decision-making.
Scientific literature holds a large array of studies on pedophilia, which is the marked and persistent sexual attraction towards prepubescent children, and many of these studies tested various hypotheses in order to gain a general picture of pedophiles as a population. In this regard, a number of differences have been observed between pedophiles and controls, which lead to the identification of specific characteristics for which pedophiles appear to distinguish themselves. However, an important limitation of these studies is their almost systematic use of forensic and clinical samples. Indeed, there is little to suggest that such samples are representative of the general pedophile population. This extensive use of forensic and clinical samples in studies on pedophiles is especially problematic considering that the conclusions of such studies are often generalised to all pedophiles. As many studies have found that pedophiles from forensic and clinical samples display multiple differences when compared to controls, we decided to assess five of these differences in order to determine if these results would be replicated within a community sample of pedophiles. We compared a community sample of 190 male pedophiles with a control group composed of 151males from the general population, examining differences in their depressive symptoms, self-esteem, psychopathic traits, height, and handedness. All participants were recruited on the internet and filled an online questionnaire. Data were tested based on three different levels of analysis, each assessing a particular division of participants regarding their sexual orientation. Differences between pedophiles and controls were not statistically significant for depressive symptoms, self-esteem, height, and handedness. Difference between pedophiles and controls reached statistical significance for psychopathic traits, with pedophiles displaying fewer psychopathic traits compared to controls. These results contradict the findings of the large majority of studies using forensic and clinical samples of pedophiles. An analysis of the data controlling for age, race, country of residence, and sexual gender-orientation did not substantially change the overall pattern of results, except that the difference between the two groups for psychopathic traits was now only significant for one of the three levels of analysis. Our results therefore suggest that pedophiles from forensic and clinical samples are different from those in community samples and that generalizing the conclusions drawn from forensic and clinical samples to all pedophiles is an important methodological and conceptual bias.
The primary aim of this exploratory research was to gain information from minor-attracted persons (MAPs) about their (a) formal and informal experiences with help-seeking for minor attraction, (b) perceived barriers to seeking help for concerns about minor attraction, and (c) treatment priorities as identified by consumers of these services. A nonrandom, purposive sample of MAPs ( n = 293, 154 completed all questions) was recruited via an online survey. Results show that 75% of participants did seek formal help from a professional; however, just less than half of them found the experience to be helpful. Characteristics of helpful therapeutic encounters included nonjudgmental attitudes, knowledge about minor attraction, and viewing clients in a person-centered and holistic way. Barriers to help seeking included uncertainty about confidentiality, fear of negative reaction or judgment, difficulties finding a therapist knowledgeable about MAPs, and financial constraints. Understanding or reducing attraction to minors were common treatment goals, but participants also prioritized addressing general mental health and well-being related to depression, anxiety, loneliness, and low self-esteem. Implications for effective and ethical counseling and preventive interventions for MAPs are discussed.
The present study examined the latent structure of pedophilic interest. Using data from phallometric tests for pedophilic interest across four samples of offenders (ns = 805, 632, 531, 261), taxometric analyses were conducted to identify whether pedophilic interest is best characterized as taxonic or dimensional. Across the samples, the majority of analyses supported taxonic latent structure in pedophilic interest. Visual inspection of taxometric curves indicated trichotomous latent structure (i.e., three-ordered classes) may characterize pedophilic interest in these samples. In a second step of taxometric analysis, the results supported trichotomous latent structure, indicating the presence of a complement taxon and two pedophilic taxa. In comparison to the complement taxon, the men in the first pedophilic taxon were non-exclusively pedophilic and had similar rates of sexual recidivism and sexual compulsivity. The men in the second pedophilic taxon were exclusively pedophilic, had more child victims and total victims, sexually re-offended at a higher rate, and were more sexually compulsive. The finding of trichotomous latent structure in pedophilic interest is both consistent and inconsistent with previous taxometric studies and has implications for research, assessment, and treatment of pedophilic interest.
Ongoing political controversies around the world exemplify a long-standing and widespread preoccupation with the acceptability of homosexuality. Nonheterosexual people have seen dramatic surges both in their rights and in positive public opinion in many Western countries. In contrast, in much of Africa, the Middle East, the Caribbean, Oceania, and parts of Asia, homosexual behavior remains illegal and severely punishable, with some countries retaining the death penalty for it. Political controversies about sexual orientation have often overlapped with scientific controversies. That is, participants on both sides of the sociopolitical debates have tended to believe that scientific findings—and scientific truths—about sexual orientation matter a great deal in making political decisions. The most contentious scientific issues have concerned the causes of sexual orientation—that is, why are some people heterosexual, others bisexual, and others homosexual? The actual relevance of these issues to social, political, and ethical decisions is often poorly justified, however.
In her recent article, Hebephilia: Quintessence of Diagnostic Pretextuality (published in Behavioral Sciences and the Law, 2010), Karen Franklin expands on her previous argument that psychologists and psychiatrists should not diagnose as abnormal hebephilia, the sexual preference for early pubescent children. She supports her argument with a series of claims about the contents of the empirical literature and the scientists who produced it. The present document provides fact-checking of those claims, revealing that Franklin's conclusions are based largely on demonstrable falsehoods.
Self-identified bisexual men report high sexual arousal to both male and female stimuli, but no study to date has compellingly demonstrated that such men have a bisexual pattern of genital arousal. We examined sexual arousal patterns among bisexual men recruited using stringent criteria designed to exclude those who were less likely to have sexual interest in both sexes. Furthermore, we included a bisexual stimulus depicting a man engaged in sex simultaneously with another man and a woman. On average, the bisexual men showed a bisexual arousal pattern, with respect to both self-reported and genital arousal. Additionally, the bisexual men were more aroused by the bisexual stimulus compared with the homosexual and heterosexual men. Some bisexual-identified men have bisexual genital arousal patterns, although it remains unclear how common they are.
This report presents national estimates of several measures of sexual behavior, sexual attraction, and sexual identity among males and females aged 15-44 years in the United States, based on the 2006-2008 National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG). These data are relevant to demographic and public health concerns, including fertility and sexually transmitted infections among teenagers and adults. Data from the 2006-2008 NSFG are compared with data from the 2002 NSFG and other national surveys.
Data for 2006-2008 were collected through in-person interviews with a national sample of 13,495 males and females in the household population of the United States. The measures presented in this report were collected using audio computer-assisted self interviewing (ACASI), in which the respondent enters his or her own answers into the computer without telling them to an interviewer. The overall response rate for the 2006-2008 NSFG was 75%.
Sexual behaviors among males and females aged 15-44 based on the 2006-2008 NSFG were generally similar to those reported based on the 2002 NSFG. Among adults aged 25-44, about 98% of women and 97% of men ever had vaginal intercourse, 89% of women and 90% of men ever had oral sex with an opposite-sex partner, and 36% of women and 44% of men ever had anal sex with an opposite-sex partner. Twice as many women aged 25-44 (12%) reported any same-sex contact in their lifetimes compared with men (5.8%). Among teenagers aged 15-19, 7% of females and 9% of males have had oral sex with an opposite-sex partner, but no vaginal intercourse. Sexual attraction and identity correlates closely but not completely with reports of sexual behavior. Sexual behaviors, attraction, and identity vary by age, marital or cohabiting status, education, and race and Hispanic origin.
The penile response profiles of homosexual and heterosexual pedophiles, hebephiles, and teleiophiles to laboratory stimuli depicting male and female children and adults may be conceptualized as a series of overlapping stimulus generalization gradients. This study used such profile data to compare two models of alloerotic responding (sexual responding to other people) in men. The first model was based on the notion that men respond to a potential sexual object as a compound stimulus made up of an age component and a gender component. The second model was based on the notion that men respond to a potential sexual object as a gestalt, which they evaluate in terms of global similarity to other potential sexual objects. The analytic strategy was to compare the accuracy of these models in predicting a man's penile response to each of his less arousing (nonpreferred) stimulus categories from his response to his most arousing (preferred) stimulus category. Both models based their predictions on the degree of dissimilarity between the preferred stimulus category and a given nonpreferred stimulus category, but each model used its own measure of dissimilarity. According to the first model ("summation model"), penile response should vary inversely as the sum of stimulus differences on separate dimensions of age and gender. According to the second model ("bipolar model"), penile response should vary inversely as the distance between stimulus categories on a single, bipolar dimension of morphological similarity-a dimension on which children are located near the middle, and adult men and women are located at opposite ends. The subjects were 2,278 male patients referred to a specialty clinic for phallometric assessment of their erotic preferences. Comparisons of goodness of fit to the observed data favored the unidimensional bipolar model.
Phallometric assessments of single-victim sexual offenders against children have suggested that only about 50% of these men are more attracted to children than they are to adults. This has raised the question of what motivates the other 50% of men to approach young girls for sex. Freund et al. showed that gynephilic men (i.e., men preferentially attracted to adult women) evidenced greater arousal to images of prepubescent girls than to images of males of any age or to nonerotic images, arguing that gynephilic men may approach prepubescent girls as a "surrogate" for their preferred erotic targets (i.e., adult women). One might argue that these phallometric results are artifactual, given that they were obtained in a time period during which images of nudity were far less common than they are today (thus any female nudity might have elicited arousal). To address this issue, the authors examined the sexual arousal patterns of 214 contemporary men who, based on self-report, offense history, and phallometric responses, were purely gynephilic. Results showed the "classical control profile": the greatest arousal to adult women, systematically decreasing arousal as the female stimuli became younger, and essentially no arousal to any age categories of males or to neutral (nonerotic) stimuli. Arousal to both pubescent and prepubescent girls was significantly greater than to neutral stimuli (p < .001 for both). Thus, Freund et al.'s results still appear to be valid, and the explanation for child molesting that they suggest still seems to be feasible.
This article is a reply to letters from Gregory DeClue, Karen Franklin, Diederik F. Janssen, Charles Moser, Joseph J. Plaud, Philip Tromovitch, and Thomas K. Zander regarding the article, Pedophilia, hebephilia, and the DSM-V. Blanchard et al. (2009). Archives of Sexual Behavior, 38, 335–350.
The term pedophilia denotes the erotic preference for prepubescent children. The term hebephilia has been proposed to denote the erotic preference for pubescent children (roughly, ages 11 or 12-14), but it has not become widely used. The present study sought to validate the concept of hebephilia by examining the agreement between self-reported sexual interests and objectively recorded penile responses in the laboratory. The participants were 881 men who were referred for clinical assessment because of paraphilic, criminal, or otherwise problematic sexual behavior. Within-group comparisons showed that men who verbally reported maximum sexual attraction to pubescent children had greater penile responses to depictions of pubescent children than to depictions of younger or older persons. Between-groups comparisons showed that penile responding distinguished such men from those who reported maximum attraction to prepubescent children and from those who reported maximum attraction to fully grown persons. These results indicated that hebephilia exists as a discriminable erotic age-preference. The authors recommend various ways in which the DSM might be altered to accommodate the present findings. One possibility would be to replace the diagnosis of Pedophilia with Pedohebephilia and allow the clinician to specify one of three subtypes: Sexually Attracted to Children Younger than 11 (Pedophilic Type), Sexually Attracted to Children Age 11-14 (Hebephilic Type), or Sexually Attracted to Both (Pedohebephilic Type). We further recommend that the DSM-V encourage users to record the typical age of children who most attract the patient sexually as well as the gender of children who most attract the patient sexually.
The authors describe a model of autobiographical memory in which memories are transitory mental constructions within a self-memory system (SMS). The SMS contains an autobiographical knowledge base and current goals of the working self. Within the SMS, control processes modulate access to the knowledge base by successively shaping cues used to activate autobiographical memory knowledge structures and, in this way, form specific memories. The relation of the knowledge base to active goals is reciprocal, and the knowledge base "grounds" the goals of the working self. It is shown how this model can be used to draw together a wide range of diverse data from cognitive, social, developmental, personality, clinical, and neuropsychological autobiographical memory research.
The specificity of phallometric testing for pedophilia has been calculated using sex offenders against adult women. Does the offender's actual number of prior sexual contacts with women affect such estimates? To answer this, the authors' studied 82 male sex offenders against adult women, 172 offenders against unrelated children, and 70 offenders against their own biological children or stepchildren. Phallometric testing included visual and auditory depictions of prepubescent, pubescent, and adult males and females. The results for offenders against women showed that those who had had sexual contact with the greatest number of women (consenting or nonconsenting) had the lowest probability of being diagnosed as pedophilic. Specificity, calculated for those who had sexual contact with the most women and thus the most evidence of attraction to them, was 96%. Sensitivity, calculated analogously for men with the most offenses against children, was 61%.
It is widely but incorrectly believed that the t-test and linear regression are valid only for Normally distributed outcomes. The t-test and linear regression compare the mean of an outcome variable for different subjects. While these are valid even in very small samples if the outcome variable is Normally distributed, their major usefulness comes from the fact that in large samples they are valid for any distribution. We demonstrate this validity by simulation in extremely non-Normal data. We discuss situations in which in other methods such as the Wilcoxon rank sum test and ordinal logistic regression (proportional odds model) have been recommended, and conclude that the t-test and linear regression often provide a convenient and practical alternative. The major limitation on the t-test and linear regression for inference about associations is not a distributional one, but whether detecting and estimating a difference in the mean of the outcome answers the scientific question at hand.
Many psychological tests have arbitrary metrics but are appropriate for testing psychological theories. Metric arbitrariness is a concern, however, when researchers wish to draw inferences about the true, absolute standing of a group or individual on the latent psychological dimension being measured. The authors illustrate this in the context of 2 case studies in which psychologists need to develop inventories with nonarbitrary metrics. One example comes from social psychology, where researchers have begun using the Implicit Association Test to provide the lay public with feedback about their "hidden biases" via popular Internet Web pages. The other example comes from clinical psychology, where researchers often wish to evaluate the real-world importance of interventions. As the authors show, both pursuits require researchers to conduct formal research that makes their metrics nonarbitrary by linking test scores to meaningful real-world events.
This article reviews the definition and assessment of pedophilia, describes the relationship between pedophilia and sexual offenses against children, and provides an overview of our current theoretical understanding of the etiology of pedophilia. A great deal is known about the assessment of pedophilia--attributable to public and professional concerns regarding the empirical association between pedophilia and sexual offenses against children--but much remains to be learned about pedophilia, including its prevalence in the general population, cross-cultural manifestations, developmental trajectories, and causes. Recent research suggests that neurodevelopmental problems and childhood sexual abuse play a role in the etiology of pedophilia, but the mechanisms that are involved are unknown. Future directions for research on assessment methods and etiology are highlighted.
We conducted an Internet survey of 1,102 men sexually attracted to children concerning their history of adjudicated offenses related to child pornography and sexual contact with children. Most of the men reported no offenses, but their rate of offenses was much higher than that expected for adult-attracted men. Correlates of offending are consistent with a strong role of the cumulative effects of temptation, especially age. Older men, men who had repeatedly worked in jobs with children, men who had repeatedly fallen in love with children, and men who had often struggled not to offend were especially likely to have offended. Attraction to male children, relative attraction to children versus adults, and childhood sexual abuse experiences were also strong predictors of offending. In contrast, permissive attitudes regarding child-adult sex and frequent indulgence in sexual fantasies about children were not significantly related to offending. Our findings represent the first large study of offending among men sexually attracted to children who were not recruited via contact with the legal system. Because of methodological limitations, our findings cannot be definitive. Reassuringly, however, results are generally consistent with those from the most pertinent existing studies, of recidivism among convicted sex offenders.
Tells a story about Professor X who was given an assignment to distribute "football numbers" to his university. Professor X liked dealing with cardinal numbers not ordinal numbers because cardinal numbers had rules that could be followed and obeyed. After a dispute about the sample and distribution of numbers he realizes that "football numbers" obey the same laws of sampling as they would if they were real honest-to-God cardinal numbers. The next year, he thinks, he will arrange things so that the population distribution of his "football numbers" is approximately normal. Then the means and standard deviations that he calculates from these numbers will obey the usual mathematical relations that have been proven to be applicable to random samples from any normal population. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
In this article, I address the question of whether pedophilia in men can be construed as a male sexual orientation, and the implications for thinking of it in this way for scientific research, clinical practice, and public policy. I begin by defining pedophilia and sexual orientation, and then compare pedophilia (as a potential sexual orientation with regard to age) to sexual orientations with regard to gender (heterosexuality, bisexuality, and homosexuality), on the bases of age of onset, correlations with sexual and romantic behavior, and stability over time. I conclude with comments about the potential social and legal implications of conceptualizing pedophilia as a type of sexual orientation in males.
Evidence is reviewed that for older adults the period from 10 to 30 years of age produces recall of the most autobiographical memories, the most vivid memories, and the most important memories. It is the period from which peoples' favorite films, music, and books come and the period from which they judge the most important world events to have originated. Factual, semantic, general-knowledge, multiple-choice questions about the Academy Awards, the World Series, and current events from this period were answered more accurately by two different groups of 30 older adults tested 10 years apart. A cognitive theory based on the importance of transitions and several noncognitive theories are considered as explanations of this pervasive phenomenon.
The paraphilia section of Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, Text Revision (DSM-IV-TR) is being misinterpreted in the forensic evaluations of sexually violent offenders. The resulting misuse of the term paraphilia not otherwise specified, hebephilia, has justified the inappropriate involuntary commitment of individuals who do not in fact qualify for a DSM-IV-TR diagnosis of mental disorder. This article has two purposes: to clarify what the DSM-IV-TR was meant to convey and how it has been twisted in translation within the legal system, and to warn that the DSM-5 proposal to include pedohebephilia threatens to make the current bad situation very much worse in the future.
We investigated the sensitivity of our phallometric test for pedophilia (and hebephilia). An initial sample of subjects included 47 men accused of sexual offenses against minors and 26 control subjects-men accused of offenses against adult women (exhibitionism, rape, or sexually sadistic activity). A second sample included 107 offenders against minors and 30 control subjects. In both samples, the offenders against minors were further classified according to the targets of their sexual offenses (girls, boys, or both) and according to the extent to which they admitted an erotic preference for the immature physique. Computerized diagnostic rules were developed with the first sample and cross-validated with the second. The sensitivity of the test in detecting pedophilia or hebephilia in complete nonadmitters is probably greater than or equal to 55% but is certainly less than 100%. Its specificity appears to be over 95%.
Do gay men have more sexual interest in children than straight men do? [Blog comment] Retrieved from http:// www.psychologytoday.com/blog/fetishes-i-dont-get/201102/do-gay- men-have-more-sexual-interest-in-children-straight-men-do Hebephilia is not a mental disorder
- A Dreger
Dreger, A. (2011, February 28). Do gay men have more sexual interest in
children than straight men do? [Blog comment]. Retrieved from http://
www.psychologytoday.com/blog/fetishes-i-dont-get/201102/do-gay-
men-have-more-sexual-interest-in-children-straight-men-do
Frances, A., & First, M. B. (2011). Hebephilia is not a mental disorder in
DSM–IV–TR and should not become one in DSM–5. Journal of the
American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law Online, 39, 78 – 85.
FAQ. Retrieved from http://www.virped.org/ index
- Virtuous Pedophiles
Virtuous Pedophiles. (n.d.). FAQ. Retrieved from http://www.virped.org/
index.php/f-a-q
Received January 26, 2016
Pedophilia and sexual offending against children: Theory, assessment, and intervention
- M C Seto
Seto, M. C. (2008). Pedophilia and sexual offending against children:
Theory, assessment, and intervention. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/11639-000
What is sexual orientation and do women have one? Contemporary perspectives on lesbian, gay, and bisexual identities (pp. 43– 63)
- J M Bailey
Bailey, J. M. (2009). What is sexual orientation and do women have one?
In D. A. Hope (Ed.), Contemporary perspectives on lesbian, gay, and
bisexual identities (pp. 43– 63). New York, NY: Springer. http://dx.doi
.org/10.1007/978-0-387-09556-1_3
Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders
American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (5th ed.). Washington, DC: Author.
Survey data of men sexually attracted to adult women
- J M Bailey
- K J Hsu
- P A Bernhard
Bailey, J. M., Hsu, K. J., & Bernhard, P. A. (2016). Survey data of men
sexually attracted to adult women. Unpublished raw data.
Psychiatric group backtracks on pedophilia classification. The New American. Retrieved from http
- D Bohon
- D. Bohon
Do gay men have more sexual interest in children than straight men do? [Blog comment] Retrieved from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/fetishes-i-dont-get/201102/do-gay-men-have-more-sexual-interest-in-children-straight-men-do
- A Dreger
- A. Dreger
Over 80 percent of dark-web visits relate to pedophilia, study finds. Wired. Retrieved from http://www.wired.com-percent-dark-web-visits-relate-pedophilia-study-finds
- A Greenberg
- A. Greenberg
Facts about homosexuality and child molestation. Retrieved from http
- G M Herek
- G. M. Herek
APA statement on DSM-5 text error: Pedophilic disorder text error to be corrected
- E Herold
- E Connors
Herold, E., & Connors, E. (2013, October 31). APA statement on DSM-5
text error: Pedophilic disorder text error to be corrected. Retrieved from
http://www.dsm5.org/Documents/13-67-DSM-Correction-103113.pdf
Psychiatric group backtracks on pedophilia classification. The New American
- D Bohon
Bohon, D. (2013, November 12). Psychiatric group backtracks on pedophilia classification. The New American. Retrieved from http://www
.thenewamerican.com/culture/family/item/16925-psychiatric-groupbacktracks-on-pedophilia-classification
This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.
This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.
Do gay men have more sexual interest in children than straight men do?
- A Dreger
Dreger, A. (2011, February 28). Do gay men have more sexual interest in
children than straight men do? [Blog comment]. Retrieved from http://
www.psychologytoday.com/blog/fetishes-i-dont-get/201102/do-gaymen-have-more-sexual-interest-in-children-straight-men-do
Phallometric diagnosis of pedophilia
- K Freund
- R Blanchard
Freund, K., & Blanchard, R. (1989). Phallometric diagnosis of pedophilia.
Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 57, 100 -105. http://dx
.doi.org/10.1037/0022-006X.57.1.100
Over 80 percent of dark-web visits relate to pedophilia, study finds
- A Greenberg
Greenberg, A. (2014, December 30). Over 80 percent of dark-web visits
relate to pedophilia, study finds. Wired. Retrieved from http://www
.wired.com/2014/12/80-percent-dark-web-visits-relate-pedophiliastudy-finds
Facts about homosexuality and child molestation
- G M Herek
Herek, G. M. (n.d.). Facts about homosexuality and child molestation.
Retrieved from http://psc.dss.ucdavis.edu/rainbow/html/facts_
molestation.html