NCJ Number
165769
Date Published
1997
Length
166 pages
Annotation
This book is intended to be both a resource to help children understand their sexual touching problems in a therapeutic context and a springboard for individual treatment efforts on behalf of the special youth for whom it was published.
Abstract
The format for the book is that of youth with sexual behavioral problems who have received treatment talking to the readers (youth with sexual behavioral problems), who have not yet sought help for the problems. The book first talks about honesty as the first step in trying to deal with confused and problematic sexual feelings and problems. Under the assumption that the urge to do harm to another sexually stems from a youth's own sexual victimization, the book urges the victim to tell some significant person about what has happened to them. This is followed by a chapter that explains sexual victimization and the constructive way to handle it. It discusses the feelings associated with sexual victimization and how these feelings may become translated into sexual feelings toward others that lead to coercive, manipulative, or assaultive sexual behavior that harms and injures others. Another chapter discusses "sexual touching problems" in detail, followed by a chapter that profiles the "sexual offense cycle." The latter chapter describes the psychological and behavioral dynamics that can lead to victimizing sexual behavior. The intent is to help the reader understand the warning signs that constitute the build-up toward illegal and victimizing sexual behaviors. The concluding chapter discusses ways to stop the sexual offense cycle.