Sexuality Education & Therapy with Children
The disclosure of children who exhibit problematic sexual behaviors
Full Article Title: The disclosure of children who exhibit problematic sexual behaviors
Open Access: No
Abstract
Background: Practitioners mandated to protect child development are sometimes dealing with children’s inappropriate sexual behaviors. This set of behaviors presents a potential hindering impact on the child’s development and important consequences for all children involved. Denial during the questioning of the child complicates the investigation of these cases.
Objective: The objective of this study was to explore and to identify the different contexts of questioning in which children disclose or deny having committed a sexual behavior that appears to be problematic for his/her development as well as identifying the individual and contextual variables that influence the outcome of the questioning.
Participants and setting: The sample comprised of 120 instances of inappropriate sexual behavior exhibited by 85 children aged between 5 and 17 years old and reported to the Youth Protection Department at the Integrated Health and Social Services University Network in the province of Quebec, Canada.
Methods: Bivariate statistical analyses were performed to investigate the association between the outcome of disclosure or non-disclosure, and contextual factors (questioning person’s role, parents’ reaction to the child’s behavior, the child’s expression of remorse, presence of a witness, use of coercion during the sexual behavior). Logistical regression (GLMM) was then used to determine the strength of the association between the covariates and the outcome of the questioning.
Results: Results show that disclosure appears to be influenced by a combination of contextual variables, namely the role/status of the person questioning the child, expression of remorse reported by the child, and the presence of a witness to the behavior/s. Conclusions: Our findings point to the importance of developing more comprehensive and specialized knowledge about the questioning context that favors the disclosure of children who are thought to have exhibited inappropriate sexual behaviors.
Relevance
“Early intervention with children who exhibit SBP [sexual behavior problems],” which is often linked to viewing pornography, “is essential to ensure a positive development. Children need to discuss their
problems and disclose their wrongdoing if intervention and help are to be effective. To achieve this, it is important to understand how collaboration is established and the variables that influence the disclosure process among children. Our results suggest that YPS [youth protection services] professionals might be the interviewers of choice in these cases since they seem able to establish a higher level of collaboration in their interventions than parents or other external authorities (e.g., teacher). Our findings also suggest that children are more likely to disclose when they express remorse about their behaviors and when the evidence against them is stronger. This finding might have to do with the context of the interview, the nature of the behavior manifested, and the approach taken by the interviewer. Finally, the results suggest that parents have an influence on their child’s decision to disclose or not. When parents react negatively, that is, by expressing anger against the child for his/her wrongdoing or denying that the alleged SBP/situation
is true, children are more likely to deny than disclose.”
Citation
Bergeron, A., Deslauriers-Varin, N., Daignault, I., & Lussier, P. (2022). The disclosure of children who exhibit problematic sexual behaviors. Child Abuse & Neglect, 134, Article 105923. doi: 10.1016/j.chiabu.2022.105923.