Abstract
The present paper reviews the empirical literature on the proportion of child sexual abusers who were themselves sexually victimized as children. While findings in individual studies ranged between 0% and 67%, on average about 28% of the offenders reported being sexually victimized as children. This rate is higher than the base rate for community samples of non-offending males (about 10%), but is similar to the rates found in other sexual or non-sexual offender populations. The relationship between childhood sexual victimization and sexually abusing children as an adult does not appear to be specific; rather, it is probable that many forms of childhood maltreatment can lead to many forms of behavioral and psychological problems in adulthood.
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Hanson, R.K., Slater, S. Sexual victimization in the history of sexual abusers: A review. Annals of Sex Research 1, 485–499 (1988). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00854712
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00854712