Lecture 7 Flashcards
1
Q
What are the effects of child abuse?
A
- Interpersonal difficulties
- Post-traumatic stress
- Cognitive distortions
- Emotional pain
- Avoidance
- Impaired sense of self
2
Q
What are the rates of sexual deviance?
A
- Deviant sexual fantasies thought to be highly prevalent in offender samples >80%, and some offenders claim their fantasies led to criminal behaviour
- Measures of deviance in non-offender samples rare but estimates that around 10% have pedo fantasies and 30% have rape fantasies
- Rates of sexual deviance are roughly the same in non/offender populations
- All studies anonymous self-report = problems
3
Q
What was a study looking at male Ugs?
A
- Self-report questionnaire about sexual fantasies and actual behaviour
- Show high levels of fantasies - 68% sexual assault, 13% pedo, 62% sadism, but much lower actual behaviours - strong correlations between fantasies and behaviours
- Psychopathic traits shown to be strong predictor that fantasies were translated into behaviours
- Issues: self-report
4
Q
Where does sexual interest come from? (study)
A
- Goats and sheep were ‘cross-fostered’ at birth and then returned to live with their own species at age 1
- Animals maintained species-specific patterns of aggression, climbing, feeding and vocalisations
- Male goats chose to mate with sheep, and girl sheep mated with male goats, 60% of female goats wanted to mate with male sheep
- After a few years, male preference does not change whereas female preference does
- For males: cross-fostered animals preferred to mate with females of their maternal species (not their own) = remained after 3y after living with own species
- For females: small preference for adopted species to begin with but completely reverses over 3y
- Thought sexual preference is established when young: potentially within the first year, females tend to be more malleable
5
Q
Where does sexual interest/deviance come from?
A
- Male interest emerge early in life and are then hard to change
- Women’s preference appear more fluid
- May account for vast difference in rates of diagnosed sexual deviance where 90% are men
6
Q
Can sexual interest be altered?
A
- Clearly shows alterations in sexual preference in early life in goats
- Unclear how it is produced
- Many attempts to alter people’s unwanted sexual attractions e.g pedos do not want to be paedos and feel guilty via castration, lobotomy, drugs, electric shocks
- Sexual orientation change efforts: highly controversial - often tied with religious views - did not find evidence for such changes but concluded evidence was poor = can rid someone of sexual interest by shocks but cannot change it
7
Q
What was a study looking at if sexual interest can be altered?
A
- Meta-analysis review of efforts to change paedo attractions
- Focuses on PPG measures - physiological measure instead of self-report
- Behavioural and pharm interventions show moderate to large effects for reducing paedo arousal
- Results really show that penile arousal to children was reduced but not increased to adults = reduction of strength of arousal but not direction
8
Q
What is the Finkelhor Model?
A
- Way of thinking instead of scientific model
- Describes four steps to offending:
- Thinking stage: motivations = drive to offend, depends on sexual deviance e.g attracted to children is a drive AND it needs to satisfied a need (emotional congruence). Attack children for a need for company or easy victim = great deal of denial of these thoughts
- Overcoming internal inhibitions: offenders know they are doing wrong - justify actions via cognitive distortions
- Overcoming external inhibitions: Degree of planning going into an offense e.g isolating victim, and seemingly irrelevant decisions (SIDS)
- Overcoming victims resistance: illegal and sex offending: use of force/threat/drugs, grooming or creating authority e.g priests
9
Q
What are the rates of offending?
A
- Vast majority of offenses are not reported, when they are reported, not enough evidence, ends up being one word against another
- Followed 4000 sex offenders over three countries, after 8 years, 22% has a conviction for sexual crime
- Correlation between time at large and recidivism was large = longer follow up = more crimes
- Problem with reconviction: those in prison are more likely to have more offenses than reported and not reported as a sexual crime, and not listed as sexual crime e.g breaking in and assault would be labelled as breaking in
- Study used polygraph as a mean to get truer picture of number of offenses committed - offenders believe that we will catch them lying
- Before polygraph = 2.5 victims, during = 13.6 victims, increase in type of victims 80% increase in number of offenders who reported male victims
10
Q
Predicting sexual violence?
A
- Meta-analysis over 87 studies
- Most important factors are sexual deviance, previous sexual crimes, early onset of offending, having a previous male/stranger victim, past criminal history
- Not predictive: sexually abused as child, substance abuse, general psych problems, treatment
11
Q
What was a study looking at predicting sexual violence?
A
- Most recent meta-analysis
- Attempting to find psychologically meaningful risk factors, and to find factors that can be changed/target for treatment or causal
- Predictions of who will re-offend is poor
- Actuarial instruments are used and work: SORAG
- Structured professional judgement schemes
12
Q
How to measure sexual deviance?
A
- Interviews
- Questionnaires
- Problems of self-report: knowing self, norming self, lying
13
Q
Define sexual deviation?
A
- Relatively stable pattern of deviant sexual arousal (arousal to inappropriate stimuli)
- Does not have to be accepted or enjoyed by the individual
14
Q
How to assess sexual deviance?
A
- Do not rely solely on an analysis of offence history as people can rape but not be aroused by coercion = can pretend it is consensual by ignoring/denying it = just don’t have anyone to have sex with
- Opposite: deviance may not mean they perform those actions either
- Fantasies are crucial = looking for deviance
- What other people say, behaviour tends to be parallelled in other areas
- What kind of porn do they consume
- Patterns of sexual activity whilst institutionalised
- Physiological evaluations like PPG
15
Q
What are the physiological methods?
A
- PPG: can measure strain of erection, can be done for females with clitoris
- Originally developed to identify homosexual = illegal and getting out of army
- Stimuli of various category e.g child, adult, violence
- Deviance defined by greater response to deviant stimuli
- Ethical issues of producing stimuli with regard to child sex
- Pupil dilation: dilation = sexual attraction
