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The Consequences of Child Sexual Abuse
The Finkelhor-Browne Traumagenic Components list.
There is no broadly accepted framework
on the effects of child sexual abuse. However, Finkelhor and Browne have developed a list
of areas that are affected by the sexual interaction of adults with children. It is a
fairly comprehensive framework and seems to be gaining wide acceptance in the professional
community. All the affects are listed in terms of the molested child, but they are
feelings, misconceptions, and thought patterns the molested child may carry into
adulthood.
- Traumatic Sexualization
- the child's sexuality is distorted by age-inappropriate sexualization.
- The perpetrator rewards
inappropriate sexual behavior, by trading gifts, affection, privileges, or attention for
sex. He is overly attendant to or distorts the meaning and importance of bodily parts. He
also conveys misconceptions and confusions about sexual behavior and accepted morality.
The abusive behavior may associates in the child fearful memories and events with sex.
- The sexual
traumatization may be enhanced if the perpetrator attempts to arouse a sexual response
from the child rather than interacting with the child as a passive object.
- Increased levels of
trauma are associated also with having enticed the child to participate, high levels of
fear associated with sex, and with a child that has a better understanding of the
implications of the behavior.
- The child may develop
distorted views of sexual norms, become confused over sexual identity, become sexual
aggressive, or tend to extremes, with either a heightened sensitivity and attraction to
sexual behavior or highly negative feelings to all sexual activity.
- Betrayal - the child's
expectations of how or what others will provide for care and protection can be severely
warped.
- In intrafamily abuse,
the sense of lost trust and dependency can extend beyond the perpetrator to other family
members. Especially significant can be the perceived reactions of the other family members
to the revelation of abuse.
- Grief reactions,
depression, hostility and anger are all common expressions towards the sense of betrayal.
- The child may display
an impaired ability to judge the trustworthiness of others.
- All or nothing extremes
in behavior or thinking may be expressed. The child may be delinquent, aggressive, and
show discomfort in close relations, or he or she may become overly attached and be
indiscriminate in relations with all adults.
- Powerlessness -
continued invasion gives rise to feelings of vulnerability, and may damage self-efficacy
if the child cannot convince others of the abuse or sees no one stopping the abuse.
- The child may become
fearful and anxious, suffer nightmares, become depressed, run away, or show truancy.
Eating and sleeping disorders may occur.
- The child may express a
strong desire to control events and people.
- The child may try to
gain control of conflicting emotions by recapitulating the experience by trying to abuse
others.
- Stigmatization - the
child's sense of being is denigrated and the child is isolated from a larger society.
- The perpetrator may
explicitly denigrate and blame the victim, or the child may blame himself or herself for
the abuse, and therefore feel an overwhelming sense of shame and responsibility.
- The child's sense of
self-esteem is lowered.
- The child has a feeling
of being different from everyone around him or her.
- The child will isolate
himself or herself from peers, may participate in criminal or delinquent behavior, may
abuse drugs and alcohol, may practice self-mutilation, and
may become suicidal.
Psychological and emotional fallout for abused males.
Abused male children show some symptoms that are
particular or appear to be more pervasive in for this class of victim.
- Boys suffer confusion
over sexual identity and fear of homosexuality.
- They display increased
aggressive behavior after the abuse.
- There is strong denial
or minimization of the impact of the abuse on the part of the parents.
- Emergency room records
show that half of the admissions of sexual assault involving boys are violent, and that
boys are more likely to be physically injured as a result of sexual assault than girls.
- Boys have a greater
tendency than girls to re-enact their abuse by abusing other children.
References:
- Finkelhor, D., Child Sexual Abuse: New
Theory and Research. (New York: Free Press,1984).
- Rogers, C.M., and T. Terry, "Clinical Intervention
with Boy Victims of Sexual Abuse," in I.R. Stuart and J.G. Greer (eds.), Victims of Sexual
Aggression: Treatment of Women, Children, and Men.(p.91-104), (New York: Van
Norstand Reinhold Co.).
- Ellerstein, N., and J. Canavan, Am. Jour. of Dis. of
Child. , 134-3. 255-257. (1980).
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