NCJ Number
176179
Journal
Canadian Journal of Criminology Volume: 41 Issue: 1 Dated: January 1999 Pages: 33-56
Date Published
1999
Length
24 pages
Annotation
Department of Social Services data on 400 juvenile prostitutes from Regina and Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada, were used to examine the connections between abusive childhoods, personal and educational success, and involvement in the youth sex trade and to study the effects of prostitution on these youths.
Abstract
The research tested the associations between involvement in prostitution and psychological, physical, and emotional safety. The data were also analyzed within the racial contexts of aboriginal and non-aboriginal ancestry. Results revealed that youth are involved in prostitution partly because their early lives were characterized by neglect and abuse. Findings also suggested that a child's self-concept and affective abilities, probably associated with early sexual abuse, physical abuse, or both, determine involvement in the sex trade. Moreover, teenage prostitution creates a context in which the involved youth have a high risk of being damaged by a predator or by themselves, either directly through assault and self-injury or indirectly through high-risk behavior. Furthermore, prostitution particularly predisposed non-aboriginal youth to self-injury, whereas young aboriginal prostitutes were more vulnerable to violence from strangers than were the other youths. Findings indicated the need for an immediate, non-legalistic, non-condemnatory intervention strategy, as well as school-based interventions and the involvement of police as front line social workers as well as peace and crime control officers. Tables, note, and 43 references (Author abstract modified)