Risk Factors for Sexual Offending in Men Working with Children: A Community-Based Survey

Identifying risk factors for sexual abuse in men who work with children and who have already abused a child could lead to more appropriate screening and prevention strategies and is thus of major scientific and societal relevance. 

A total of 8649 German men from the community were assessed in an extensive anonymous and confidential online survey. Of those, 37 (0.4 %) could be classified as child sexual abusers working with children, 90 (1.0 %) as child sexual abusers not working with children, and 816 (9.4 %) as men who work with children and who have not abused a child. 

We assessed the impact of working with children as an individual risk factor for self-reported child sexual abuse and compared personal factors, pedophilic sexual fantasies, deviant sexual behaviors, antisocial behaviors, and hypersexuality among the three groups. Most interestingly, working with children was significantly associated with a self-reported sexual offense against children; however, it explained only three percent of its variance. 

Child sexual abusers working with children admitted more antisocial and more sexually deviant behaviors than child sexual abusers not working with children and than men working with children who have not abused a child. 

Our findings support some of the suggestions made by other researchers concerning factors that could be considered in applicants for child- or youth-serving institutions. However, it has to be pointed out that the scientific basis still seems premature.

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By:  Turner D1, Hoyer J2, Schmidt AF3, Klein V4, Briken P4.

• 1Institute for Sex Research and Forensic Psychiatry, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Martinistrasse 52, 20246, Hamburg, Germany. turner.daniel@gmx.de.
• 2Institute of Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy, Technische Universität Dresden, Dresden, Germany.
• 3Institute for Health and Behaviour, Health Promotion and Aggression Prevention, University of Luxembourg, Esch-sur-Alzette, Luxembourg.
• 4Institute for Sex Research and Forensic Psychiatry, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Martinistrasse 52, 20246, Hamburg, Germany.
• Arch Sex Behav. 2016 May 16.

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