Recent studies have shown that referral rates for children who exhibit problematic sexual behavior (PSB) has increased significantly in recent years (despite a downward trend among other age groups), signaling a growing recognition of PSB among children (DeLago et.al 2019). Whether this represents an uptick in the number of incidents or increase in reporting is not known.
There is a growing recognition that between 30-50% of children who experience sexual victimization are sexually abused by other children or adolescents (Tabachnick & Prescott, 2020). These abusive children have their own trauma history of physical abuse, sexual abuse, neglect, witnessing domestic violence, and parental drug use or alcohol use.
In a 2019 study, Delago et.al. found that youth engaging in PSB were younger than those in previous studies and a much higher percentage (66% versus 33-38% on other studies) were related to the children they sexually harmed. More than half (58%) of the children in this study had been exposed to sexually explicit materials, which climbed to 72% for youth 13 or older (versus 42% nationally for 10-15-year-old youth). This finding is significant because children who viewed sexually explicit materials initiated more invasive sexual behaviors compared to children who did not view these materials.
This research is more concerning as the world is experiencing a global pandemic. In an effort to curb the spread of the Coronavirus, schools have closed, and youth spend more time on their computers, unsupervised. At the same time we have seen an explosion in access to online pornography. This has brought with it a dramatic increase in the extent of children’s exposure to it.
Bottom Line
Children who exhibit problematic sexual behaviors are more likely to have been exposed to multiple adverse experiences. Sadly, a high percentage of these children have also accessed sexually explicit materials and that is associated with more invasive sexual act. To be clear, and the research confirms this, viewing explicit sexual materials is not a causal characteristic. The research is equally clear- no one experience will lead a child to exhibit problematic sexual behaviors (Tabachnick & Prescott, 2020).
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