In the aftermath of disclosing child sexual abuse: consequences, needs, and wishes

ABSTRACT

Experiencing child sexual abuse (CSA) can have enormous consequences for the victims. However, reporting rates are comparably low. Thus, it is essential to consider the wishes and needs of disclosing CSA victims in order to develop measures that can improve the disclosure and reporting of CSA. We analysed data of a subsample of n = 394 victims of contact CSA from a representative victim survey (N = 11,428) conducted by the Criminological Research Institute of Lower Saxony, Germany, in 2011. Overall, 76% of the victims disclosed their CSA experience to somebody. However, only 14% of the cases were made known to law enforcement agencies. Of the disclosing victims, only one-third was believed and 43% reported that the disclosure led to no further consequences. Overall, being believed as well as supported by the victims’ family proved to be crucial. Implications are discussed against the background of previous research.

KEYWORDS:

• Child sexual abuse
• sexual violence
• disclosure
• compensation
• representative victim survey

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Originally, the sample additionally contained representative data of persons with Turkish and Russian immigrant background, as these groups constitute the largest immigrant groups in Germany. Because of the small subgroups of contact CSA victims with immigrant background (Turkish: n = 14; Russian: n = 44), we restricted our analyses to the German subsample of contact CSA victims without immigrant background.

2. Nothing can be said regarding either the temporal order of or the causal relation between reporting to the police and confiding in one or more person(s) of trust.

3. No statistically significant gender differences regarding measures taken following the abuse were detected.

4. No statistically significant gender differences regarding consequences of disclosing the sexual abuse were detected.

5. No statistically significant gender differences regarding desired consequences after CSA disclosure revealed.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research [grant number 01SR1002].