SEXUALLY ABUSED-CHILDREN 5 YEARS AFTER PRESENTATION - A CASE-CONTROL STUDY

Objective. A total of 68 sexually abused children and their nonoffendi ng parents were reassessed 5 years after presentation and were compare d with a cohort of children of similar age and sex who were not known to have been abused. Method. Outcome measures were behavior, depressio n, self-esteem, anxiety, eating problems, drug use, suicide attempts, self-injury, running away, criminal activity, and attributional style. Recent life events, demographics, family functioning, and mothers' me ntal health were taken into account when examining outcome. Results. A lthough the abused children had experienced more negative life events, were from lower socioeconomic groups, had more changes in parent figu res, and had mothers who were more psychologically distressed, multipl e regression analysis showed that after allowing for these and other d emographic factors, there were still significant differences between t he groups after the 5 years. The abused children displayed more distur bed behavior, had lower self-esteem, were more depressed or unhappy, a nd were more anxious than controls. Sexually abused children had signi ficantly higher levels of bingeing, self-injury, and suicide attempts. Conclusions. It is clear that many children who are sexually abused h ave ongoing problems. Their ongoing problems may be indicative of fals e beliefs about themselves and the sexual abuse experience.