Sexual Abuse

Questionnaires are relied upon by forensic psychologists, clinicians, researchers, and social services to assess child molesters' (CMs') offense-supportive beliefs (or cognitive distortions). In this study, we used an experimental procedure to evaluate whether extrafamilial CMs underreported their questionnaire-assessed beliefs. At time one, 41 CMs were questionnaire-assessed under standard conditions (i.e., they were free to impression manage). At time two, CMs were questionnaire-assessed again; 18 were randomly attached to a convincing fake lie detector (a bogus pipeline), the others were free to impression manage. The results showed that bogus pipeline CMs significantly increased cognitive distortion endorsements compared to their own previous endorsements, and their control counterparts' endorsements. The findings are the first experimental evidence showing that CMs consciously depress their scores on transparent questionnaires.

In this paper, the modus operandi of 103 adolescents involved in sexual offenses against children (12 year old or less) is analyzed. Modus operandi strategies were measured by the participants' responses to the Modus Operandi Questionnaire. Findings indicate that the degree of intrusiveness of the sexual behaviors committed by the adolescents is contingent on the participation of their victims during the sexual episodes. Moreover, the more strategic adolescents may be more likely to secure compliance. This study shows the relevance of analyzing adolescent modus operandi as purposeful behavior and discusses some implications of the findings for crime-commission or offending process models.

A cohort of 136 rapists and 115 child molesters civilly committed to a prison in Massachusetts and followed for 25 years (see Prentky, Lee, Knight, & Cerce, 1997) was examined for the effect of age at time of release on sexual recidivism. The present study (1) examined the recidivism rates for each of five age-at-release groups, separately for rapists and child molesters, (2) tested the fit of linear and quadratic models for 5, 10, 15, 20, and 25-year windows using Cox regression analysis, (3) presented the predicted failure rates for rapists (up to five years post-release) and child molesters (out 21 years post-release), and (4) provided a computational formula for estimating the sexual recidivism rate given an individual's age and number of years post-release. For rapists, a linear model extending 5 years best captured our data (LR = 5.62, p < .02). Going out any further than 5 years did not enhance the predictive efficacy of the model. By contrast, a quadratic model extending the full duration of the study (25 years) provided the best fit (LR = 6.30, p < .04) for child molesters. Our data supported the general conclusion that risk of sexual recidivism diminishes as a function of increasing age at time of release for rapists. We found marked differences, however, in the re-offense patterns of rapists and child molesters, with the latter group evidencing a distinct quadratic, rather than linear, pattern. Since these findings derive from a population screened for civil commitment by virtue of their presumptive dangerousness, they may not be generalizable to samples of sex offenders drawn from the general prison population.

In a recent article Looman and Marshall (2005) questioned the validity of phallometric assessment of rapists based on the results of a study of incarcerated rapists and child molesters. In this commentary we offer (1) a critique of the methods used and conclusions reached by Looman and Marshall and (2) a discussion of important methodological issues relevant to phallometry. We conclude that the correct inference from Looman and Marshall's study is that rapists, as a group, show a pattern of sexual arousal to audiotaped scenarios of coercive and non-coercive sex that significantly differs from the pattern of groups of non-sex offenders, in agreement with the general literature on this question.