Will our children really be any safer from sexual abuse?

This is the question that we all want the answer to. After all, if the children will not be safer, why bother with all the hassle, the conflict, and the time?

The problem is, there is no easy or simple answer to that question. The conventional wisdom among experts is that our efforts will make children safer. However, in order to assess whether children will really be safer, we need to look at a couple of different factors and then decide for ourselves whether the possibility of a safer world is more than a pipe dream.

The necessary conditions
The background against which these questions need to be asked and evaluated is the conditions that are necessary for child sexual abuse to occur. In 1984, Dr. David Finkelhor published one of our most important books on child sexual abuse. In "Child Sexual Abuse: A New Theory and Research"[i] he defined a functional model for understanding how child sexual abuse occurs. According to Finkelhor, there are four conditions that must be met before sexual abuse can or will occur. [ii]

---The potential molester had to have some motivation to abuse the child sexually. (Either because of a preference for sex with children or a willingness to go beyond appropriate relationship boundaries between adults and children.)

---The potential molester had to overcome any reticence or inhibitions about acting on these sexual feelings for children.

---The potential molester had to overcome environmental and other external obstacles to committing the sexual abuse.

---The potential molester had to overcome or chip away at any resistance that the child exhibited.[iii]

The model was developed based on a great deal of research about how sexual abuse occurs.[iv] For our purposes, the important thing to remember is that all four elements or conditions need to be present for child sexual abuse to occur. Therefore, interruptions in any one these four conditions can interrupt and, in fact, will derail the abuse process.

The only persons who can do something about the first and second conditions are the potential molesters. They alone can identify their inappropriate desires for sexual activity with children and therefore take the necessary actions to stop themselves from acting out. This means that the rest of us must look to ways to stop the process by concentrating on the third and fourth conditions.

Environmental and other external obstacles
In the Protecting God's Children™ for Adults program by VIRTUS®, we address several ways that we can influence whether a molester has the opportunity to abuse a child. The first three steps of the Plan for protecting children deal directly with ways to place environmental and other external obstacles in the path of a potential molester.

Step 1: Know the warning signs.
Learning about the behavioral signs that are indicators of someone who is a potential risk of harm to children helps us recognize and intervene in risky situations. By learning these signs and then taking the time to observe the people around us who interact with children and young people, we can interrupt the grooming process and protect a child from abuse.

Step 2: Control access
Initiating a comprehensive screening process for anyone who wants to work with our children and young people is a key factor in weeding out those with less than wholesome intentions.

Step 3: Monitor all programs
Establishing comprehensive, effective monitoring guidelines for all programs involving children and youth - and then following the guidelines without fail can go a long way toward assuring all involved that the environment is safe.

We must learn the warning signs and pay attention to those around us when they are interacting with children and also be willing to intervene if something doesn't quite seem right. We must establish and follow the recommended guidelines for screening the staff and volunteers who work with our children. We must adopt and implement monitoring programs and guidelines for all activities involving children.

If we implement these three steps into our lives and our environments, we will create obstacles for would-be child molesters. It is up to us to follow through with this objective and be rigorous with those around us and with ourselves.

Overcoming the child's resistance
For about the last 20 to 25 years, professionals in the field of child sexual abuse prevention have been teaching children to resist the overtures of someone who is a potential molester. We have taught children that they have the right to say "no." We have encouraged them to get away from the person who makes them feel uncomfortable or confused as quickly as possible and to tell someone what happened - someone that they trust.

In this way, we have begun to build up children's ability to resist the overtures of child molesters. In a recent study of the marked decline of child sexual abuse cases over an eight year period from 1992 to 2000, researchers concluded, once they considered a number of possible and plausible explanations, that the educational work we are doing with children is paying off.[v]

There are other factors that point to an actual decline in child sexual abuse such as an increase in the number of offenders being apprehended, convicted and incarcerated. In addition, there was a marked decrease in the number of children running away from home and a decline in the number of teen pregnancies during the same time frame.[vi]

Research reminds us that teaching children how to resist the overtures of a potential molester requires repetition and reinforcement.[vii] Children and young people need to know the rules and they need to hear them over and over and over again so that the rules become part of a thought process. This is done the same way we teach the rules about looking both ways before crossing the street and the danger of getting too close to an open flame.

Empowering children to speak up and resist the overtures of potential molesters can stop a child molester in his or her tracks. Molesters who fear being caught - and being labeled a molester - may decide it is not worth the risk and back off.

Conclusion
It is very hard to prove a negative and yet, to be sure that children are safer we would need to prove that abuse did not happen. However, if we look at the preconditions that Dr. Finkelhor defined and we focus our attention on the conditions that we can affect, our efforts to educate ourselves and empower our children result in a world where children are safer, and that is the primary goal for each of us.

[i] Finkelhor, D., Child Sexual Abuse: A New Theory and Research, New York: Free Press (1984) [ii] Id. at 54. [iii] Id. [iv] Id. [v] Finkelhor, D., Jones, L. Explanations for the Decline in Child Sexual Abuse Cases, OJJDP, Juvenile Justice Bulletin, January 2004 at 8, 9, & 10. [vi] Id. at 9 and 10. [vii] Davis, M. Katherine and Gidycz, Christine A. (2000). "Child Sexual Abuse Prevention Programs: A Meta-Analysis." Journal of Clinical Child Psychology, 29(2). This article is the copyrighted property of The National Catholic Risk Retention Group, Inc. (Copyright @t 1999-2007 by the National Catholic Risk Retention Group, Inc., all rights reserved), and is reprinted here with permission. For more information about VIRTUS@Online or other VIRTUS® services, visit www.virtus.org or call (888) 847-8870. This weekly series of feature stories, commentary and analysis is compiled and edited by an advisory group to the Media Relations Office of the Archdiocese, through which the articles are distributed. This is the sixtieth in a series.