Re: CASA report

[Evan Harrington <EVAN-H@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I have not read the CASA report and I am not familiar with their
findings, but regarding your question about the association of
childhood victimization and adult offending there is evidence
to consider.  Cathy Widom is well known for her prospective study
examining various forms of childhood victimization and later adult
offenses. I don't have the citations at the moment but I'm sure
you all have them or can find them.  Widom found a small effect
of physical abuse and neglect on later violent offending, but as
for sexual abuse...there was no relation to adult sexual offending.
At a conference I asked Widom about this issue, to which she
responded that there appears to be no sexual cycle of violence.
A couple of years ago there was a GAO report examining the sexual
cycle of violence, which examined Widom's data, data from Linda Williams,
and some other data, and their conclusion as well was that there is
no support for the idea of a sexual cycle of violence.

For clinicians, of course, it is possible to have a preponderance of clients
who have experienced abuse and report abusing others.  However, the
clinician must remember that there are distinct selection biases at work
in determining which types of people come to you (or are brought to you)
for treatment.  For some individuals, childhood sexual abuse may be a
factor in later sexual offenses.  But for the general population,
this does not appear to be a risk factor.


Evan R. Harrington, Ph.D.