Mental health articles

Professional response to child sexual abuse This section now considers professional responses to victims and nonoffending mothers once sexual abuse is identified. Again, these sections compare the profession’s response in child sexual abuse to that information available in the empirical knowledge base. Studies presented in this section are more varied than in the previous section but typically reflect samples of professionals who are queried about their views concerning child sexual abuse and decisions they make regarding how to intervene. Studies presented in this section were reviewed in the previous chapter. Views and practices concerning the child: Experts in the area of child sexual abuse concur that sexually abused children are victims and must be held blameless. Concomitantly, studies of apportioned blame in hypothetical abuse vignettes find that only a small proportion of that blame is allocated to victims. Of more concern, however, is the percentage of professionals who apportion any blame to the victim. In studies published in the 1990s, 12% to 45% of professionals continue to attribute some, even if minimal, blame to the victim (Kalichman, Craig, & Follingstad, 1990; Kelley, 1990; Reidy & Hochstadt, 1993). Further, older victims and those described as more encouraging are apportioned more responsibility for the abuse (Johnson, Owens, Dewey, & Eisenberg, 1990; Wagner, Aucoin, & Johnson, 1993). Some writers also continue to endorse outdated and fictitious views of preschool girls as sexually provocative (for example, see Gardner, as cited in Faller, 1996). Another concern is that some professionals continue to believe that false allegations of abuse by children are a significant problem. For example, some child protective services workers consider that at least half of all disclosures by adolescents are false (Everson & Boat, 1989). Further, most professionals continue to believe that allegations made within a custody or divorce dispute are more likely to be false (Marshall & Locke, 1997). Indeed, child protective services routinely screens out reports of abuse made within these disputes, considering most of them to be maliciously filed (Downing, Wells, & Fluke, 1990; Giovannoni, 1991). When these cases are screened in and then investigated, only about 15% are substantiated (Haskett, Wayland, Hutcheson, & Tavona, 1995). These views by some professionals stand in stark contrast to the empirical knowledge base in which less than 1% of all abuse reports are intentionally false (U.S. Department of Health & Human Services,2000c), and in which 5% or less of all sexual abuse reports made within a custody or divorce dispute are intentionally false (Faller, 199 1 a; Faller & DeVoe, 1995). Views and practices concerning the nonoffending mother: Regretfully, the response to nonoffending mothers is even more biased. First, because only 7% to 8% of all abuse is committed by a father (Russell, 1984; Wyatt, 1985), a nonoffending father is potentially available as a supportive guardian in approximately 92% to 93% of all abuse. A review of studies on guardian support, however, found that 99% of nonoffending guardians in cases of identified abuse were mothers (Bolen, 2000b). Another concern is the views maintained by child protective services about nonoffending mothers. As previously discussed, whereas only 0.05% of all offenders of committed abuse are mothers, 27% of identified offenders are mothers (Table 12-I), suggesting that workers continue to maintain extraordinary biases. Further, whereas 0.6% of parental abuse is committed by mothers, they are charged as offenders in more than half of the cases of identified parental abuse. Thus, it is not surprising that in hypothetical vignettes, a significant proportion of nonoffending mothers continue to be blamed for the abuse. In studies published in the 1990s, 70% to 86% of professional respondents attributed some responsibility to the mother for the abuse (Johnson et al., 1990; Kelley, 1990; Reidy & Hochstadt, 1993), and 59% of professionals in one study agreed that mothers should apologize to the victim for their failure to protect (Conte, Fogarty, & Collins, 1990). Indeed, some treatment centers require that mothers apologize before the victim is returned home (Giarretto, 1982, 1989). Most mental health workers also believe that these mothers are emotionally immature (Freet, Scalise, & Ginter, 1996). Extraordinary biases also continue in the literature regarding the mother’s response during and after the abuse. For example, even though 75% to 95% of mothers across studies are unaware of ongoing abuse (Faller, 1990; Meyer, 1985), one study found that child protective services workers considered that more than 80% of mothers were aware of the ongoing abuse (Ryan, Warren, & Weincek, 1991). Further, whereas 81% of mothers across studies are partially or fully supportive of their children after disclosure (Bolen, 2000b), other studies find that 40% to 59% of children are immediately removed from their homes, and up to two-thirds are eventually removed for some period of time (Faller, 199 1 b; Hunter, Coulter, Runyan, & Everson, 1990; Ryan et al., 1991). The disparity between the number of children removed and the number of supportive mothers again suggests that biases against nonoffending mothers continue.

Tags: child, sexual abuse