Parenting Among Women Sexually Abused in Childhood

Dataset Number: 85
Investigator(s): Benedict, M.
Abstract: The first objective of the present study was to examine the direct and indirect impacts of childhood sexual abuse on maternal attitudes, perceptions, and behavior.  The second objective was to determine whether the severity of abuse experienced as a child influences parenting outcomes.  The study's participants were a subset of 357 primiparous women interviewed at 28 to 32 weeks' gestation between the fall of 1990 and early 1992.  At the time of the initial interview, almost 35% of the women reported sexual abuse before age 18.  The severity of the abuse was classified on the basis of the following conditions: penetration or attempted penetration, contact but no attempted penetration, and non-contact.  In 1995 and 1996, 265 women, 74% of the original sample, were re-interviewed when their children were between two and fours years old.  In this sample 40% of the respondents had been identified as sexually abused in the first study.  In the follow-up interview variables measuring parenting outcomes included: child-rearing competence, satisfaction, and efficacy; parenting stress; discipline practices; and family functioning.  Variables measuring possible mediating factors between a history of sexual abuse and parenting practices included: education, occupation, income, family structure; current physical and mental health parameters, particularly depressive symptomatology; perceived current stresses unrelated to parenting; current family violence or sexual victimization; and parental sense of mastery.  The data file distributed for this study contains 265 cases and 556 variables.
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