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Despite the current high-profile concern over paedophiles and paedophilic activity, there is no easily accessible or widely accepted multi-disciplinary definition of paedophilia. Commentators have pointed to a general contemporary misunderstanding surrounding the subject of paedophilia, and to the tensions between strong beliefs and facts in both societal and correctional contexts. We suggest that the current situation — societal, clinical and legal — can be problematic for both offenders and practitioners who are currently charged with, and involved in the risk treatment and/or management of paedophiles. This article attempts to begin to address these issues by looking at conceptions of paedophilia from a multi-disciplinary viewpoint. We examine understandings from clinical and legal sources, and present this analysis in a historical and cultural context. In drawing these divergent conceptions together, we highlight various contradictions and discrepancies. We suggest that these inconsistencies present significant problems in terms of professional engagement with paedophilia and paedophiles, and as a result illustrate the need to engage in more detailed debate regarding what constitutes ‘the problem’. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Abstract: In France, sex offenders can be condemned to a therapeutic injunction, instead of or after an imprisonment period. In order to reinforce the prevention and punishment of sexual offences, the condemnation law (June 17, 1998) obliges a sexual convict to submit to surveillance and assistances measures and, in some cases, to mandatory medical care (a treating physician, psychiatrist or psychologist, and a coordinating physician, the intermediary between medicine and the courts). The aim of this research was to assess the therapeutic injunction functioning (n = 16) and to identify the obstacles in coordinating medical and judicial professionals. Therefore, we conducted a local survey that involved in-person interviews with medical (treating physicians and coordinating physicians) and judicial (sentencing judge) professionals in charge of the 16 sex offenders (non incestuous paedophiles) condemned to a therapeutic injunction. The treating physicians and the coordinating physicians were very different in their settings and in their understanding of the therapeutic injunction procedure. Health and judicial professionals criticized the lack of interactions between professionals, but not the therapeutic injunction itself. This work highlighted the necessity of (1) a better coordination between health and justice professionals, (2) the creation of a treatment and assessment centre for sex offenders. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The explanations given by child pornography offenders for their crimes were explored in two samples, one interviewed by the police as part of a criminal investigation and the second assessed by clinicians following a child pornography conviction. There were many similarities across the two samples with regard to demographic characteristics, criminal history and explanations. Many offenders in both samples admitted possession of child pornography, a majority admitted they deliberately accessed child pornography, and substantial minorities acknowledged their sexual interest in child pornography and/or children. Similar proportions claimed curiosity or accidental access. Relatively few offenders reported internet addiction, child pornography as a substitute for contact offending or indiscriminate sexual interests. There was evidence to suggest that the recently arrested offenders were more sexually deviant, as they were more likely to have images of boys, larger collections, images depicting sexual violence or other paraphilic content and more involvement in online trading and communication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research investigates student/trainee-professional implicit theories of paedophilia and their explanations for the current crisis of paedophilia. The research methodology is based on a previous research design (Sternberg, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 49, 607-627, 1985), and consists of two interrelated studies. Study 1 (n=60) develops scales for student/trainee-professional implicit theories of paedophilia and Study 2 (n=188) uses these scales in conjunction with other scales to define the student/trainee-professional implicit theories of paedophilia and to measure the potential explanations for the current crisis of paedophilia. The findings indicate that student/trainee-professional implicit theories of paedophilic personalities (pathology, abusive and mentally disordered old offender) and behaviours (devious, child focused, cognitive distortions, secretive, child lovers, sexual abusers, socially inept and grooming) seem to reflect both previous research and expert opinion. These tentative findings suggest that student/trainee-professionals' implicit theories of paedophilia, and as such the current crisis of paedophilia in modern society, seem to have developed in part from the transfer of expert knowledge (explicit theories), the impact of the media, and social constructionalism; and not from the student/trainee-professionals' individual personality and coping traits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Paula Vogel's "How I Learned to Drive" provides a case study in trauma and in the ways one might work through trauma to achieve 'post-victim' status. Vogel refracts the story of sexual abuse through Li'l Bit, a narrator-protagonist who exercises control over her past experiences by dramaturgically manipulating them in the present performance. The key components that enable her adult control over her childhood trauma are forgiveness on her part (of both her Uncle Peck and herself) and witnessing on the audience's part. Li'l Bit's newfound ability to tell her story on her own terms and have that story witnessed in performance allows her to begin the healing process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1999, Durkin and Bryant analysed an online “boy love” support forum and categorized justifications given by self-identified paedophiles for their sexual interest in children. The present study replicates this to identify how this forum is currently being used, given the changes in technology over the intervening years. It remains unclear whether or not interacting online influences the commission of offline sexual offences; however, receiving support from like-minded individuals is thought to promote pro-offending beliefs in socially isolated individuals. The results of this study offer an insight into the types of justifications used to account for a paedophilic sexual orientation and help to demonstrate how this forum functions to fulfil the needs of the “boy lovers” who make up the membership of this internet site. The study highlights changes over the last nine years, but provides support for increased use of such a forum, in spite of it being “old technology”. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Zeitschrift für Sexualforschung is the property of Georg Thieme Verlag Stuttgart and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Psychotherapeut is the property of Springer Nature and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Have radical discourses about children's sexual liberation/empowerment become normative technologies of neoliberal governmentality? How do we see sexualised representations of girls and what does the sexualised child look like? A contemporary consensus between media narratives and radical cultural critiques about the dangerous intolerance of child sexual abuse (CSA) moral panics suggests that the CSA moral panic discourse is caught up in the neoliberal “regulation of intolerance” (Brown 2006) through the governance of the gaze. Focusing on the 2008 Australian media event that erupted over Bill Henson's “art” photographs of naked girls, this article analyses how a perception that the images sexualised children was governed by experts as a reactionary and perverse CSA moral panic gaze. I argue that this form of governance depends on the exclusion of the political gaze of the survivor, a gaze that has been vital to a feminist critique of hetero-normative paedophilia. Re-claiming an affective feminist gaze involves thinking beyond the upwardly mobile discourse of CSA moral panic and through the occluded question of the sexual politics of paedophilia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents an overview of the health risks that are associated with sex tourism, which is a type of tourism in which the primary purpose of a trip is to have sexual relations with another person. A discussion of countries in which sex tourism is seen frequently and of things that tourists can do to help avoid health risks is presented. Research which has been conducted on sex tourism is discussed.

Abstract: This contribution questions the positive/negative eugenics dichotomy that typifies the historiography on the eugenic movement in the Netherlands and the claim that this movement was mostly marginal because only positive eugenics was pursued. From 1938 to 1968 in the Netherlands, after a decade of debates, 400 sex offenders who had been committed to asylums for the criminally insane were ‘voluntarily’ and ‘therapeutically’ castrated. For political reasons debates on castration, meant to create consensus, eliminated any reference to or connotation with eugenics, yet these policies were unthinkable without them. This article shows that thinking about social and sexual problems and their solutions in the 1930s were permeated by eugenic folklore which in turn was informed by sexual folklore. Both eugenic and sexual lore, as common sense, or as ways of knowing, were about individual and collective loss of self control which was referred to with a catch-all phrase: ‘hypersexuality’. Although sexual classifications used in diagnosing sex offenders suggested the existence of discrete sexual categories, homosexuality for instance was not seen as a sexual alternative or as an identity but as the extent to which an offender suffered from a form of hypersexuality that threatened the fabric of society. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The article primarily proposes a discussion on a clinical and psychopathological level concerning the bond between the child victim and the sexual attacker. We wonder about the influence which the adult of pedophilic structure establishes on his victim like the becoming of the latter. We will note that the repercussions in the deferred action of the traumatism plural and are differed in time. It is starting from a simple and paradigmatic clinical situation at the same time that we will release the tension fields of our reflexion. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In the present study we analysed to what extent the categories used in empirical child molester research were sociolegal (based on offence types) or psychopathological (based on nomological systems of psychological types or mental disorders). Based on a systematic Medline and PsycInfo search, 714 empirical studies on child molesters from 1972 to 2004 were analysed with regard to the categories and diagnostic procedures used. The majority of studies used a grouping procedure based on an offence-orientated criterion (child molesters versus others), whereas only a few referred to diagnoses and, hence, to nomological systems utilized in clinical psychology and psychiatry. The results also indicated the presence of extensive classification pluralism and a dominance of publication in specialized forensic journals. Critical consequences of this research practice are discussed with regard to comparability of studies, heterogeneity of study groups, theory development and, particularly, the generalizability of child molester research. Finally, we propose a research strategy that is grounded more profoundly in methodological considerations and a more interdisciplinary orientation in sexual offender research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Estudios Sociológicos is the property of El Colegio de Mexico AC and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Cognitive distortions are held to contribute to sexual offending against children in a number of theoretical explanations of such crimes. However, not only is there little or no direct evidence in support of the centrality of cognitive distortions in offending but recent research has questioned whether the concept has explanatory power. Cognitive distortions are variously seen as necessary for the offender to offend against children, as post-offending justifications for the offence, or as reflecting distorted patterns in the offender's upbringing. This paper explores the role of cognitive distortions in sex offending by comparing the distortions of contact sex offenders against children with Internet child pornography offenders without contact offences against children. A new cognitive distortions questionnaire was developed which was suitable for administration to Internet offenders who had no contact offences against children as well as being suitable for contact offenders. It was found that some cognitive distortions are frequently agreed with by sex offenders against children whereas others were seldom or never agreed with. Little support was found for earlier typological approaches to the cognitive schema of sex offenders against children. Contrary to the expectation that contact offenders would have more cognitive distortions, it was found that Internet offenders had more cognitive distortions that children are sexual beings. Furthermore, there were no differences in cognitive distortions justifying the offence. However, offenders with a previous history of offending were more likely to admit to cognitive distortions which justify their offending. It is accepted that cognitive distortions are readily recognized in interviews with sex offenders against children. Nevertheless, it is argued that there is a need for new research to stimulate a new understanding of the nature and role of cognitive distortions in sex offending. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The crime of child murder is considered the most heinous and least comprehensible of all violent crimes. This study examines the visual representation of 12 high profile child abductions and murders in broadsheet and tabloid newspapers from two countries over a 70-year time frame. The body of coverage produced almost 1000 images and these were examined using a content analysis of the individual subjects of these photographs, followed by a qualitative analysis of the main patterns which emerged. The study produced two expected findings: that the coverage has become increasingly visual, and that the visuals were overwhelmingly ‘personal’. Within these overarching patterns, it was clear that the content of the visuals has changed over the three decades studied (the 1930s, 1960s and 1990s). In the earlier decades the visuals emphasized the role of the criminal justice system in capturing the perpetrators and bringing them to justice. In the 1990s there was a far greater focus on the victims' families, as well as the emotional responses of society as a whole: both grief for the child, and anger towards their killers and the authorities which ‘enabled’ them to offend. I explore these changes and the possible impact this visual coverage could have on public understanding of this crime, those who commit it, and how we treat them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of this study was to explore how sexual child abusers who meet the DSM-IV criteria for paedophilia differ from those who do not. We studied DSM-IV disorders and paedophilic interests in all cases of sexual child abuse referred to forensic psychiatric investigation in Sweden between 1993 and 1997 ( n =185). Frequency and severity of other mental disorders did not differ between subjects with and without DSM-IV paedophilia. However, men with paedophilia had more previous paedophilia convictions, same-sex and younger victims and less often intoxicated status when committing the act. The concept of paedophilia as a mental disorder is not supported by the DSM-IV diagnosis, which primarily describes the acting out of attraction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Zeitschrift für Sexualforschung is the property of Georg Thieme Verlag Stuttgart and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article studies recalled parental bonding, adult attachment style, and personality disorders in child molesters and reports on the findings of two separate studies. The first study examines differences between a group of 84 child molesters and 80 matched normal control subjects. This study found that the antisocial and the schizoid personality disorders are typical for the molester group, and that at an interpersonal level this group can be typified by recollections of an uncaring father and mother, recollections of an elevated level of autonomy emanating from the father, and insecure current attachment patterns. The second study compares a subgroup of personality-disordered child molesters to a subgroup without personality disorders. This study revealed that recollections of the role of the father in parenting are decisive. The personality-disordered group reports that the father was both more uncaring and granted more autonomy. Regarding current adult attachment style, an avoidant and anxious-ambivalent attachment style characterised the disordered subgroup. We argue that the results can be useful for treatment. Since recalled parental experiences play a role in the development of personality disorders and child molestation, psychotherapists should integrate interpersonal tools into treatment, especially in therapeutic work with child molesters who received less parental sensitivity and suffer from personality disorders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Pratiques Psychologiques is the property of Elsevier B.V. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Sexual offenders against children are generally inadequate in their social functioning and diverse in their psychopathology. The degree to which this inadequate functioning and psychopathology influences therapeutic interventions brings into question the belief that generic non clinical programmatic treatment work is always appropriate for such a cohort. The Sex Offenders Assessment Package (SOAP) measures inadequate social functioning and sexual deviance, but has not been linked to broader individual differences and generic psychopathology. We collected information examining the relationship between the SOAP and standard measures of personality (the NEO-FFI) and obsessive-compulsiveness (MOCI) in a sample of 200 sexual offenders against children seen by the Probation Service. Factor analysis was used to reduce the SOAP to three reliable factors: emotional distress, cognitions supporting sex with children, and concern for others. These factors correlated respectively with higher Neuroticism and lower Extroversion; greater obsessive-compulsiveness on the MOCI, and trait Agreeableness, irrespective of whether or not one corrected for socially desirable responding. When partial correlation controlled for the influence of Neuroticism on the correlation between cognitions supporting sex with children and the MOCI, there was no change in the association between these variables. These results show that negative affect and obsessional tendencies are important underlying influences on the feelings and behavior of sexual offenders, that the obsessionality of the group is not attributable to Neuroticism, and suggest useful additional foci to enhance the treatment of this diverse clinical group. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article summarises recent research into the subject of downloading child pornography and the different kinds of individuals engaged in the activity. Current attitudes to paedophilia are assessed. The question as to whether the downloading of pornographic paedophile material always leads to paedophilia is a core discussion. The law and current views on downloading are also discussed. The issue of whether downloaders of such materials are a danger is addressed and ways of preventing children being sexually exploited via the internet are explored. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Juvenile prostitution in the German welfare work is being interpreted as a peculiar behaviour which cannot be influenced by criminal law but by psychodynamic and social condition factors and motives. The public prostitution of adolescents largely takes place unaffected by criminal persecution. In view of the legislation in Germany, the regulations of criminal law have not had any decisive influence at juvenile prostitution. In Germany there exists a sufficient protection of children and adolescents, The current discussion about the expansion of the childhood definition of young people up to 18 years, and a de-legalization of agreed sexual actions between people under and over 18 years ignores a typical juvenile behaviour. A change in the situation of life of juvenile prostitutes by a legal intensification, as well as a change in behaviour through an anonymous sanction system like that of legislation, cannot be expected. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The European Union Council Framework Decision 2004/68/JI of 22.12.2003 "on combating the sexual exploitation of children and child pornography" defines as "child" any person below the age of 18. Under Austrian law there are no children between the ages of 7 and 18. The author criticizes that, up to now, the development of age limits in legal history has taken a clearly different way in the various fields of law of the Austrian legal order. The Austrian legislator's tendency, which has evolved in the course of legal history, to grant rights and permits to young people between 14 and 18 years earlier but, at the same time, to impose on them more and more obligations arising from private and public law, to give them the opportunity to grow into adult life with full powers and responsibilities step by step, totally contradicts the Council Framework Decision. Today, adolescents live in a cultural environment characterized by globalized pop culture and world-wide communication technology. Access to "extreme ideas" is offered everywhere and anytime. It is highly difficult to grow up without any interference and develop one's own personality and sexual orientation according to one's inherent nature under such circumstances of a world society, and this process may be seriously disturbed or even prevented by inappropriate prohibitions imposed by criminal law. However, the aim of any education is to accompany adolescents while they are growing up so that they become self-assured, self-responsible citizens with an understanding of how to work for peace and common welfare who know "how to walk upright" and do so, and who are informed about their civil rights and are able to exercise the same decidedly. We do not need only consumers but also citizens of the world! Repatriarchalization and criminalization are the wrong answers to the urgent questions of world society. The question how to combat child pornography commerce is certainly one of the most important concerns because... [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Though there has been a decline in the percentage of sexually active high school students in the past decade in the United States, the rate of adolescents engaging in sexual behavior leading to orgasm has actually increased. Such orgasms are achieved without penetration and penetration is how most American adolescents define sex. Most adolescent sex also occurs within intimate relationships with partners at or near their own age but definitions of what constitutes intimacy is different than in the past. Sexuality is very important in the life of adolescents in the United States, and sexual activity broadly defined begins fairly early among teenagers although actual sexual intercourse usually takes place much later. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Age of Consent throughout history has usually coincided with the age of puberty although at sometimes it has been as early as seven. Early on age of consent was a familial or tribal matter and only became a legal one in the Greco-Roman period. The Roman tradition served as the base for Christian Europe as well as the Christian Church itself which generally, essentially based upon biological development, set it at 12 or 14 but continued to set the absolute minimum at seven. In the past century there has been a tendency to raise the age of consent but the reasons for the change have not always been clear and the issue has been further complicated by the reluctance of many contemporary historians to recognize what the actual age of consent in the past has been. This failure has distorted the importance of biology on age of consent in the past. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently enacted EU-legislation will affect interferences with the sexual life of adolescents across Europe in an intensity so far not known in any of the European states. The "Framework-Directive on combating sexual exploitation of children and child-pornography" will oblige all member States of the European Union to create extensive offences of "child"-pornography and "child'-prostitution, defining as "child" every person up to 18 years of age, without differentiating between five-year-old children and 17-year-old juveniles. These offences go far beyond combating child pornography and child prostitution, thus making a wide variety of adolescent sexual behaviour, hitherto completely legal in the overwhelming majority of jurisdictions in Europe, serious crimes; for instance: sex between 16-year-olds for "remuneration", which includes invitations to cinema or to a dinner; "lascivious" drawings of a 17-year-old girl possessed by a 15-year-old boy; photographs of a 16 year-old girl in her bikini "lasciviously" exposing her pubic area, taken by her 17-year-old boyfriend on the beach; standard pornography involving younger looking 20-year-old adults or "webcam-sex" between 17-year-old-adolescents; even pictures of one's own adult spouse in "lascivious" poses, if this spouse looks younger than 18. No European jurisdiction so far has such a restrictive law. The massive criminalisation and the equation of adolescents with children caused heavy criticisms among experts but this criticism could not prevent the project from becoming law. This essay provides an analysis of the background, the legislative process and the content of the EU-Framework-Decision. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following the murder of an eight-year-old girl in July 2000, a British newspaper, the News of the World , campaigned to change the law on paedophile crimes. Most of its demands were eventually met. The narrative has four episodes: the initial campaign, popular vigilantism, political response and further debate and action following the murderer's conviction. A moral panic framework is shown to be applicable but ultimately an inadequate explanatory framework, having too rigid a conception of the state, primary definers and the control culture. Supplementary approaches from agenda setting and discourse analysis are needed. The distortion of the issues of child abuse and murder suggests a need for reconceptualisation of moral panics in terms of three dimensions: processes, discourses and normative affirmation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reviews studies carried out by the author and colleagues in which a brain wave measure, the contingent negative variation (CNV), was explored using different paradigms as a measure of deviant sexual desire in child sex offenders and of criminal (especially violent) recidivism in mentally disordered offenders. CNV was recorded using: (1) a Go/No Go paradigm in a sample of mentally disordered offenders admitted to Special Hospital in the UK and subsequently followed up over a number of years; and (2) a match/mismatch paradigm in a sample of child sex offenders admittted to a sex offender treatment unit in NZ. A CNV correlate of impulsivity, recorded using a Go/No Go paradigm, has been found to be potentially useful for predicting recidivism in mentally disordered offenders. An hypothetical CNV correlate of sexual desire, recorded using a match/mismatch paradigm, has been found to be potentially useful for identifying paedophiliac individuals. While the combined use of these measures offers a potential means of identifying child sex offenders who are likely to recidivate, their use raises some important ethical issues, which are briefly discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the characteristics of 53 sex offenders detained in maximum security at the State Hospital, Carstairs, in Scotland. Patients were categorized by diagnosis and four main groups were found: mental handicap, mental illness, mental illness with co-morbid personality disorder and personality disorder alone. As a whole, the patients had experienced multiple areas of deprivation and many had been subject to sexual abuse themselves. Our findings are consonant with other work in this area in noting the importance of deviant fantasy and positive psychotic symptoms. Detailed assessment of mentally disordered sex offenders is recommended, with consequent treatment including pharmacotherapy and a modified cognitive behavioural approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I return to the survivor case study and sex offender data I used in my paper on conceptual models of the relationship between pornography and child sexual abuse in Child Abuse Review in 1997. Here I use them to show how paedophile typologies and sex offender classifications contribute to constructing the invisibility of the normal, ordinary, heterosexual family men who sexually abuse their own and other people's children on a very substantial scale. I also use it as the basis for developing a typology which constructs the connections between incest, paedophilia, pornography and prostitution in the form of a ‘Continuum typology of child sexual abuse and the characteristics of child sexual abusers’, and captures the crossover of victims and perpetrators and the overlap of intrafamilial and extrafamilial child sexual abuse and exploitation. This, in turn, becomes the basis for constructing a ‘Nosology of child sexual abuse classification’ which genders the abusers and takes account of both the overlap and the dominant discourse currently of policing and policy, in which ‘paedophilia’ and ‘child sex offending’ have become synonymous, and incest abusers are invisible. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A punitive socio-legal policy towards sex offenders against minors has been driven by public demand. The perception of an appallingly high incidence of serious abuse by incorrigible men has been encouraged by press sensationalism, but criminal statistics and recidivism studies fail to confirm either an escalation of sex crimes against minors or the inevitability of recidivism. Retrospective victim studies have given alarming indications of the prevalence of abuse, but they have often included trivial incidents and the experiences of sexually active adolescents that do not involve real paedophiles. Clinical observation demonstrates the devastating effects of child sex abuse, but community surveys suggest that minor incidents have only minor effects, except when accompanied by other stresses. Statutory changes and prison statistics reveal the increasing punitiveness of criminal justice. Exaggerated perception of risk produces undue restrictions on children's freedom and on their interactions with teachers and other adults. Assumptions of incorrigibility impede the rehabilitation of offenders through vigilantism, stigmatization and barriers to employment. This amplifies deviance and does not protect children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some important authors in the field of sexual delinquency stress the importance of inadequate attachment in the aetiology of sexual abusive behaviour. This contribution reports on parental sensitivity, trust, intimacy and adult romantic attachment in a group of sexual offenders (exhibitionists, child molesters and child rapists) and a matched normal control group. Based on the analyses, it appears that parental sensitivity, trust, intimacy and adult romantic attachment significantly differentiate between sexual delinquents and the control group. There is no significant relationship between the different categories of sexual offenders, except for the variable adult romantic attachment. Furthermore, it was found that parental sensitivity, trust and the adult romantic attachment style contribute independently to the explanation of sexual delinquent behaviour. The results tend to be important for the prevention and the treatment of sexual delinquent behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public concern about an escalation of sex crime is unsupported by a critical analysis of official crime statistics in England and Wales. Assumptions about the inveterate recidivism of sex offenders are unconfirmed by follow-up studies. A great variety of behaviours is covered by sex crime, from the grave to the trivial. To the traditional offences of predatory aggressors, violent rapists and a small number of dangerous offenders driven by pathological emotions, are now added date rapes and harassments previously little reported. All sex incidents involving children are widely believed to cause lasting damage, despite evidence to the contrary. Female offenders and boy victims are receiving more attention. Adolescent involvement is insufficiently distinguished from paedophile offences and male homosexuals are suspected of paedophile tendencies. The development of constructive therapeutic approaches is impeded by doubts about efficacy and a punitive ethos. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A slippery slope argument is an argument to this twofold effect. First, that if a policy or practice P is permitted, then we lack the dialectical resources to demonstrate that a similar policy or practice P* is not permissible. Since P* is indeed not permissible, we should not endorse policy or practice P. At the heart of such arguments is the idea of dialectical impotence, the inability to stop the acceptance of apparently small deviations from a heretofore secure policy or practice from leading to apparently large and unacceptable deviations. Using examples of analogical arguments and sorites arguments I examine this phenomenon in the context of collapsing taboos. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigated whether an educational intervention could reduce psychologists' stigma towards clients with paedophilic obsessional intrusions and aid diagnosis. Psychologists (N = 109) read a vignette describing someone experiencing paedophilic intrusions, were asked to suggest a diagnosis, and completed measures on negative views and fear, before and after watching a brief educational video on differential diagnosis. Generalised Linear Mixed Models found a reduction in pre- to post-test scores in perception of psychological problem (F [1, 193] = 9.56, p =.002, small to medium effect size η 2 = 0.04), general concern (F [1, 193] = 34.95, p <.001, large effect size η 2 = 0.15), and fear (F [1, 194] = 47.39, p <.001, large effect size η 2 = 0.20). There was a significant difference in the number of psychologists stating obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) was the likely diagnosis pre-test (67.3%) versus post-test (97.8%), t(93) = 31.59, p <.001. These findings suggest that although psychologists were generally able to identify paedophilic intrusions as OCD, the education reduced scores of negative views and fear, despite psychologists already displaying relatively low scores, and improved recognition of OCD. This research highlights the importance of continued education of clinicians to improve outcomes for clients. • Examined psychologists' attitudes toward and diagnosis of paedophilic intrusive thoughts. • Evaluated impacts of a brief educational training in differentiating paedophilic OCD intrusions from paedophilic disorder. • Training reduced negative views and fears surrounding paedophilic OCD presentations. • Higher rates of OCD diagnosis were endorsed following the brief training. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: The pop culture phenomenon of Star Wars has been underutilised as a vehicle to teach about psychiatry. It is well known to students, registrars, and consultants alike. New Star Wars films are expected out in 2015, which will likely lead to further popularity. The purpose of this article is to illustrate psychopathology and psychiatric themes demonstrated by supporting characters, and ways they can be used to teach concepts in a hypothetical yet memorable way. Conclusions: Using the minor characters as a springboard for teaching has the benefit of students not having preconceived notions about them. Characters can be used to approach teaching about ADHD, anxiety, kleptomania and paedophilia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]