NCJ Number
213158
Journal
Journal of Child Sexual Abuse Volume: 14 Issue: 4 Dated: 2005 Pages: 43-69
Date Published
2005
Length
27 pages
Annotation
This study examined cognitive distortions about sexual offending in 11 girls who committed sexual offenses, 12 girls who committed non-sexual offenses, and 21 girls with no history of offending.
Abstract
Results indicated that girls who had sexually offended demonstrated more deviant beliefs and attitudes about sexual offending and physical aggression than both the non-sexual offending and the non-offending girls. Sexually offending girls were more likely than girls in the other two groups to deflect responsibility for the inappropriate sexual contact away from the perpetrator and were more likely to exhibit distorted beliefs about victims. In cases in which the victim’s response was ambiguous or positive, the three groups had similar patterns of responses. Participants were 44 adolescent females, ages 13 to 18 years, who were recruited from the Maine Department of Corrections, residential treatment centers, and from the community surrounding the University of Maine. The three study groups were approximately similar with respect to age and race. Participants responded to 12 vignettes describing sexual contact between an adolescent girl and a younger boy. The vignettes varied according to the type of sexual contact portrayed and the victim’s response. Statistical analysis techniques included univariate and multivariate analyses of variance. Future research should focus on investigating the emotion recognition skills of sexually-aggressive girls. Tables, figures, references