SEXUALLY ABUSED-CHILDREN IN A NATIONAL SURVEY OF PARENTS - METHODOLOGICAL ISSUES

Citation
D. Finkelhor et al., SEXUALLY ABUSED-CHILDREN IN A NATIONAL SURVEY OF PARENTS - METHODOLOGICAL ISSUES, Child abuse & neglect, 21(1), 1997, pp. 1-9
Citations number
7
Categorie Soggetti
Social Work
Journal title
ISSN journal
01452134
Volume
21
Issue
1
Year of publication
1997
Pages
1 - 9
Database
ISI
SICI code
0145-2134(1997)21:1<1:SAIANS>2.0.ZU;2-2
Abstract
In a national survey of 1,000 parents, which primarily concerned disci plinary practices and violence toward their children, two questions we re asked about whether the children had been sexually abused. This was to assess the feasibility of epidemiological research on contemporane ous sexual abuse using parental interviews rather than the usual adult retrospective approach. From these questions, rates of sexual abuse f or children currently 0-17 were estimated at 1.9% in the last year and 5.7% ever. The cases making up these rates included a nearly equal nu mber of boys and girls and no female victims between the ages of 9 and 12, a distribution different from those generally obtained by other e pidemiological methods, but due possibly in this case to normal sampli ng variation. Cases were more likely to be disclosed for children whos e parents had themselves been sexually abused, who were from lower inc ome households, or who were living with only one biologic parent. Alth ough some of the findings suggest caution in generalizing about child sexual abuse from survey samples of parents, the method is worthy of e xploration if only to gain better epidemiologic data about parent know ledge, reaction, reporting, and coping strategies. Copyright (C) 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd