NCJ Number
209916
Journal
Journal of Child Sexual Abuse Volume: 13 Issue: 3/4 Dated: 2004 Pages: 107-123
Date Published
2004
Length
17 pages
Annotation
This article describes interviewing strategies with sexually abusive juveniles that elicit accurate information and facilitate the development of a therapeutic relationship upon which effective therapy can be based.
Abstract
One of the challenges in sex offender treatment is that few clients in the early stages of treatment have any desire to change. An important development in the rehabilitation of sexual offenders has been the work on motivational interviewing by Prochaska and DiClemente (1984), Garland and Dougher (1991), and Miller and Rollnick (2002). Motivational interviewing is a model of assisting clients who may be experiencing resistance to change. It relies on a variety of techniques by which the clinician can increase the internal motivation of the client toward change and assist him/her in sustaining new behaviors and avoiding relapse. The clinician's task is to direct the client toward examining ambivalence about change and to develop discrepancy and dissonance in the client about his/her situation. In achieving this, arguments with clients should be avoided. This article outlines the six stages of change: precontemplation, contemplation, preparation, action, maintenance, and relapses. A number of techniques from the Motivational Interviewing model may be used effectively with sexually abusive juveniles. They include reading the background notes, establishing rapport, showing respect, taking care in expressing emotion, creating a context for honesty, establishing credibility and control of the interview, asking open-ended questions, being sexually explicit, anticipating embarrassment, offering hope through therapy, predicting cognitive distortions, challenging cognitive distortions, working with denial, having clients tell "their story," reframing, assuming the adolescent has a history of offending, checking suicidal ideation and depression, identifying face-saving maneuvers, providing information, expressing concern for the juvenile without therapy, and using addiction as a metaphor. Guidelines are also offered for interviewing the families of sexually abusive adolescents. 24 references