NCJ Number
145841
Journal
Journal of Child Sexual Abuse Volume: 2 Issue: 3 Dated: (1993) Pages: 15-32
Date Published
1993
Length
18 pages
Annotation
This study employed a Solomon 4-group design to evaluate a sexual abuse prevention program, using a sample of 121 preschoolers.
Abstract
The design allowed researchers to examine the effects of the pretest as well as the pretest/program interaction on posttest scores. Children were administered a modified version of the "What If" Situation Test (WIST), consisting of four vignettes, three of which depicted situations that might lead to sexual abuse and one of which depicted an appropriate touch or benign situation. The results indicated a significant main effect for testing on two of the six variables. However, contrary to the study hypothesis, pretested groups had lower posttest scores than the posttest-only groups. Children in the experimental group learned to recognize abusive situations, but pretested experimental and control children did less well than their nonpretested counterparts. Children in both the pretest experimental and control groups may have been confused by the recognition questions, which required them to confront issues they had never thought about before, and may have experienced the curriculum differently than the nonpretested experimental children. 2 tables and 35 references