1 Faculty of Law, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia.
Trauma Violence Abuse. 2018 Jul;19(3):286-304. doi: 10.1177/1524838016659487. Epub 2016 Jul 19.
Various psychological theories exist in the literature to explain the behavior of men who commit child sex offences, including the belief that child sexual abuse (CSA) is a predisposing factor for the transition from victim to offender. These theories are, however, unable to explain the fact that while most victims of CSA are female, most perpetrators of CSA are male. The sex specificity of CSA in terms of victims and offenders suggests that the experience of CSA and its psychosocial effects may be different for boys, compared to girls. We hypothesize that CSA experiences may involve risk factors that affect the development of sexually abusive behavior for boys, rather than girls. Our aim was to determine whether the literature provides evidence of a cycle of abuse from victim to offender, and, if so, to document its characteristics. We undertook a comprehensive literature review of studies on both victims and offenders, including studies which revealed the following: age of onset of CSA, duration of abuse, gender of the abuser, the relationship between victim and abuser, grooming behaviors, the types and severity of abuse, and disclosure of abuse. While we found no evidence for the existence of a cycle of abuse for female CSA victims, we discovered evidence to support the existence of a cycle of abuse for male CSA victims who had experienced particular abuse characteristics. As an original contribution to the literature, we identified four factors that may be associated with a boy's transition from victim to offender as well as the methodological issues to be addressed in future research. Based on criminological theories, we argue that these four factors share a common theme, that is, that they represent experiences of power (for the abuser) and powerlessness (for the victim).
各种心理学理论都存在于文献中，用于解释犯下儿童性犯罪的男性的行为，包括相信儿童性虐待（CSA）是从受害者过渡到犯罪者的一个促成因素。然而，这些理论无法解释一个事实，即尽管 CSA 的大多数受害者是女性，但 CSA 的大多数施害者是男性。就受害者和施害者而言，CSA 的性别特异性表明，CSA 的经历及其心理社会影响可能在男孩和女孩身上有所不同。我们假设 CSA 经历可能涉及影响男孩发生性虐待行为的风险因素，而不是女孩。我们的目的是确定文献中是否有从受害者到施害者的虐待循环的证据，如果有，记录其特征。我们对受害者和施害者的研究进行了全面的文献回顾，包括揭示以下情况的研究：CSA 的发病年龄、虐待持续时间、施害者的性别、受害者和施害者之间的关系、 grooming 行为、虐待的类型和严重程度以及虐待的披露。虽然我们没有发现女性 CSA 受害者存在虐待循环的证据，但我们发现了支持男性 CSA 受害者存在虐待循环的证据，这些受害者经历了特定的虐待特征。作为对文献的原创贡献，我们确定了四个可能与男孩从受害者过渡到施害者相关的因素，以及未来研究中需要解决的方法问题。基于犯罪学理论，我们认为这四个因素有一个共同的主题，即它们代表了权力（对施害者）和无力（对受害者）的体验。
