Childhood Sexual Abuse and Lifetime Aggression

ABSTRACT

This study of college undergraduates (N = 873) examined three hypotheses regarding associations between childhood sexual abuse and lifetime aggression: 1) childhood sexual abuse was expected to account for unshared variance in the lifetime aggression indicators after controlling for the potential effects of parental physical abuse, sibling physical abuse, exposure to intimate partner violence, peer bullying, and respondent age; 2) childhood sexual abuse associations were expected to be relatively stronger among the women than the men; 3) childhood sexual abuse links to lifetime aggression were expected to vary as a function of age of victimization (adolescent < childhood < dual-age victims). Aggression histories varied widely with over 20% reporting prior injuries inflicted on others (3.2% > five injuries). Sexual abuse links to aggression tended to be stronger (p < .001) for the women than the men, and rates of aggression were higher when sexual abuse recurred across both childhood and adolescence. Partial support was found for all three hypotheses.

KEYWORDS:

• Childhood sexual abuse
• polyvictimization
• co-occurring abuse
• lifetime aggression
• parental physical abuse
• intimate-partner violence
• peer bullying
• sibling physical abuse

Disclosure of interest

Authors Mara Norton-Baker, Jenna M. Wolff, Tyler W. Kolander, Matthew Evans, and Alan R. King declare that they have no conflicts to report.

Ethical standards and informed consent

All procedures followed were in accordance with the ethical standards of the responsible committee on human experimentation [University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, ND, U.S.A.] and with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975, as revised in 2000. Informed consent was obtained from all patients for being included in the study.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mara Norton-Baker

Mara Norton-Baker, M.A., is a doctoral student in clinical psychology at the University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, ND.

Jenna M. Wolff

Jenna M. Wolff received a B.S. in psychology in 2019 from the University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, ND.

Tyler W. Kolander

Tyler W. Kolander received his B.A. in psychology in 2019 from the University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, ND.

Matthew Evans

Matthew Evans received his B.A. in psychology in 2019 from the University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, ND.

Alan R. King

Alan R. King earned his Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Louisiana State University in 1984. He has been a professor since 1987 at the University of North Dakota where he continues to teach.