Examining Attitudes Conducive to Technology-Facilitated Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse: Evidence From a Representative Multi-Country Study

TL;DR

This study explores men's attitudes toward technology-facilitated child sexual abuse and finds that certain beliefs are linked to higher risk of acting on harmful sexual interests.

Contribution

The study introduces a new classification of attitudes toward technology-facilitated child sexual abuse and links them to offending behavior.

Findings

Three distinct attitude classes were identified, with differences in behavior and demographics.

Men who normalize abuse are more likely to act on their sexual interest in children.

Reinforcing the moral wrong of abuse could help prevent offending and aid early intervention.

Abstract

The development of primary prevention efforts to reduce child sexual abuse before it occurs has been inhibited by a lack of research into the attitudes and beliefs associated with child abuse and maltreatment. This article presents findings from 4,918 men pooled from nationally representative surveys of men in Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States, and presents a latent class analysis of men’s attitudes to technology-facilitated child sexual exploitation and abuse, and its relationship with sexual interest in children and/or sexual offending against children. This study identified and described three latent classes of attitudes towards technology-facilitated child sexual exploitation and abuse, identifying significant and meaningful behavioural and demographic differences between the three groups of men. An important finding of this study is that the shift from “normalisation/blame diffusion” (associated with the belief that technology-facilitated child sexual exploitation and abuse is normal and acceptable behaviour) to “denial of abusiveness: and restrictive stereotypes” (associated with denying that abuse is harmful and desired by the child) was associated with greater odds of acting on sexual interest in children. The finding suggests that the moral or ethical quandary posed by sexual interest in children, and the consensus that child sexual abuse is morally wrong, has an important role to play in the prevention of technology-facilitated child sexual exploitation and abuse. Interventions that seek to reinforce attitudes that child sexual abuse is harmful, and the fault of the perpetrator, may prevent at-risk men from offending. From the perspective of secondary prevention, targeting men who hold normalisation and blame diffusion beliefs may assist agencies in identifying offenders earlier in their offending trajectory. The findings also underscore the critically important role of the media and other sources of cultural influence, including the technology sector and entertainment industry, in reinforcing the moral wrong of child sexual abuse.

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