Contact sex offenders with adult and minor victims: Psychopathological and criminological differences.

BACKGROUND: Effective classification of individuals who commit sexual offences is important for their assessment, treatment, and risk management. Victim age has often been used as a distinguishing factor between perpetrators. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to analyse the distinctive psychopathological and criminological characteristics of contact sexual offenders with adult and minor victims. PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING: The study involved 97 adult males who were serving a prison sentence in Spain for at least one contact sexual offence against an adult or a minor. METHODS: Researchers gathered data on criminological variables concerning the offender, victim, and modus operandi from prison records and interviews. Participants completed the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory-III (MCMI-III) in a second session, and between-group differences were analysed. RESULTS: Sex offenders with minor victims (SOMV) had significantly lower scores than sex offenders with adult victims (SOAV) on the Antisocial (r = -0.283, p = .005) and Sadistic (r = -0.209, p = .04) personality subscales, and on the Alcohol (r = -0.426, p < .001) and Drug dependence (r = -0.332, p = .001) syndrome subscales. SOAV were also more likely to use violence and/or intimidation, use a weapon, offend against female victims, offend against an intimate partner, commit their offences in public places, serve other ongoing prison sentences, and report a history of alcohol and substance abuse. SOMV were older and more likely to offend against family members. CONCLUSIONS: These results suggest that there are key differences between SOAV and SOMV that should be considered in tailored prevention programmes for each subgroup of offenders.

Criminological differences between contact-driven and online-focused suspects in online child sexual grooming police reports.

BACKGROUND: Differences exist between contact and noncontact-driven online child sexual abuse offenders; however, there is still a notable lack of empirical studies with police samples from non-English speaking countries, including Spain. OBJECTIVE: We address this gap by analyzing the criminological characteristics of online child sexual grooming (OCSG) suspected offenders from de-identified law enforcement investigations in Spain. PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING: We anonymously coded data provided by Spanish law enforcement agencies from 257 OCSG cases (i.e., unique chat logs between a suspect and minor) extracted from 98 police reports with index investigation years from 2008 to 2021. A total of 101,391 messages were analyzed. METHODS: Three distinct datasets were created: 257 OCSG cases, 120 unique suspects (79 online-focused, 41 contact-driven), and 234 unique victims. Each dataset focused on different criminological variables for analysis, such as grooming strategy, motivation, and victim high-risk behaviors. RESULTS: There were no significant differences between suspects on gender, age, or criminal offense history. Contact-driven suspects were more likely to use positive rapport (ɸ = 0.18), send unprompted sexually explicit images of themselves (ɸ = 0.19), and offer something in exchange (ɸ = 0.25). Victims of contact-driven individuals were more likely to be male (ɸ = 0.52) and offer something in exchange for sex or sexually explicit images (ɸ = 0.18). Victims of online-focused individuals were more likely to be younger (r = 0.26). CONCLUSIONS: These findings suggest criminological differences in the online grooming strategies between contact-driven and online-focused suspected offenders in Spain.

Consensus building on definitions and types of child maltreatment to improve recording and surveillance in Europe: protocol for a multi-sectoral, European, electronic Delphi study.

INTRODUCTION: Child maltreatment (CM) is a complex global public health issue with potentially devastating effects on individuals' physical and mental health and well-being throughout the life course. A lack of uniform definitions hinders attempts to identify, measure, respond to, and prevent CM. The aim of this electronic Delphi (e-Delphi) study is to build consensus on definitions and types of CM for use in surveillance and multi-sectoral research in the 34 countries in the Euro-CAN (Multi-Sectoral Responses to Child Abuse and Neglect in Europe) project (COST Action CA19106). METHODS AND ANALYSIS: The e-Delphi study will consist of a maximum of three rounds conducted using an online data collection platform. A multi-disciplinary expert panel consisting of researchers, child protection professionals (health and social care), police, legal professionals and adult survivors of CM will be purposefully recruited. We will approach approximately 100 experts, with between 50 and 60 of these anticipated to take part. Participants will rate their agreement with a range of statements relating to operational definitions and types of CM, and free-text comments on each of the statements to give further detail about their responses and areas of uncertainty. Consensus has been defined a priori as ≥70% of the panel agreeing or disagreeing with the statement after the final round. The responses to the open-ended questions will be analysed using a 'codebook' approach to thematic analysis, and used to refine the statements between rounds where no consensus is reached. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: Ethical approval has been granted from the Cardiff University School of Medicine ethics committee (reference number SMREC22/96). Results will be submitted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal and presented at workshops (including for the participants) and international academic conferences. The Euro-CAN network will also be used to disseminate the results, with results briefings and presentations to key public health and other relevant organisations in the field.

Current issues and challenges in the definition and operationalization of child maltreatment: A scoping review.

BACKGROUND: Studies show considerable variability in the definitions and operationalization of child maltreatment (CM), which limits research, policy formation, surveillance, and cross-country and cross-sector comparisons. OBJECTIVE: To review the recent literature (2011-2021) to understand current issues and challenges in defining CM, to assist in the planning, testing and implementing of CM conceptualizations. METHODS: We searched eight international databases. Articles were included if the substantive content was related to issues, challenges, and debates in defining CM, and the article was an original study, review, commentary, report, or guideline. The review followed methodological guidance for the conduct of scoping reviews and was reported in accordance with the PRISMA-ScR checklist. Four experts in CM conducted a thematic analysis to summarize findings. Methodological rigor of the included studies was not formally assessed. RESULTS: We identified 7372 potentially relevant articles; 55 full-text studies were assessed for eligibility, 25 satisfied the inclusion criteria. We identified three themes: 1) strategies to define CM, including the integration of child and victim perspectives; 2) difficulties in defining specific CM types; and 3) real-world implications for research, prevention and policy. CONCLUSIONS: Despite longstanding concerns, challenges regarding the definitions of CM persist. A small minority of studies have tested and implemented CM definitions and operationalizations in practice. The findings will inform international multi-sectoral processes to develop uniform definitions of CM, for example by highlighting the need to acknowledge challenges in defining some CM types and emphasizing the importance of considering the perspectives of children and CM survivors.

Male Perpetrators of Intimate Partner Violence Against Women: A Spanish Typology.

Typological approaches in research of intimate partner violence against women (IPVAW) have been discussed on the basis of their validity and applicability in professional practice; yet most of the published studies on offender typologies are limited due to the use of relatively small, non-representative samples. The current study explored typologies of IPVAW perpetrators in a large-scale representative Spanish sample (n = 9,731 cases extracted from the Comprehensive Monitoring System of Gender-Based Violence Cases; VioGén System), according to classic batterer typologies proposed by Holtzworth-Munroe and Stuart (1994). To this end, the risk factors measured by the most extended Spanish police recidivism risk assessment tool (Valoración Policial del Riesgo; VPR) were used as clustering variables. Multiple correspondence analyses revealed the appropriateness of a bi-dimensional model to conceptualize IPVAW offender typologies. Our four-group solution may be described based on the levels of instability and antisociality of IPVAW offenders, as objectively measured by VPR5.0 risk indicators. Statistically significant differences between the IPVAW suggested typologies were found on all indicators, except for the presence of perpetrators younger than 24 years old and the presence of bidirectional intimate partner violence, which were equally distributed across the four groups. High instability/low antisociality (HiLa) and high instability/high antisociality (HiHa) individuals shared most risk indicators related to the aggressor's psychological instability; whereas HiHa and low instability/high antisociality (LiHa) men endorsed more antisociality indicators than statistically expected. The low instability/low antisociality (LiLa) group was characterized by the less presence of VPR risk indicators. Although the four subtypes identified in our study resembled classic typologies, we propose a new subtype, with high levels of instability and antisociality (i.e., HiHa). This work contributes to existing knowledge of the heterogeneity of these men, by providing useful typologies that can help inform prevention and treatment.

Spanish Validation of the Child Pornography Offender Risk Tool.

The current study examined the validity of the Child Pornography Offender Risk Tool (CPORT) in a sample of 304 men arrested in Spain for child pornography (CP) offenses, distinguishing between CP-exclusive offenders (n = 255) and CP offenders with other criminal involvement (n = 49). In our 5-year fixed follow-up analysis, we observed a 2.3% sexual recidivism rate for the whole sample (2.0% new CP offenses, 0.3% new contact sexual offenses). Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analyses detected some relative predictive ability of the CPORT for CP recidivism outcomes when the Correlates of Admission of Sexual Interest in Children (CASIC) was used to replace missing CPORT Item 5. Specifically, both CPORT and CASIC total scores might help predict new CP offending among CP-exclusive offenders (area under the curve [AUC] = .57 and .70, respectively). Calibration analyses found that the observed recidivism rates were much lower than the expected recidivism rates presented by the tool developers, and, thus, suggest caution over the use of these norms for applied risk assessment. Our findings provide, to some extent, preliminary evidence of CPORT cross-cultural validity.

Implicit Theories of Child Sexual Exploitation Material Offenders: Cross-Cultural Validation of Interview Findings.

Offense-supportive cognitions are thought to result from underlying implicit theories (ITs). As child sexual exploitation material (CSEM) users are a distinct type of sex offender, Bartels and Merdian proposed that CSEM offenders hold five different ITs from those endorsed by contact sex offenders (i.e., Unhappy World, Self as Uncontrollable, Child as Sexual Object, Nature of Harm [CSEM variant], and Self as Collector), linked by an assumption about the Reinforcing Nature of the Internet. This article reports a conceptual content analysis of 23 interviews conducted with CSEM offenders in the United Kingdom and Spain. Support for all CSEM-specific ITs was found across both samples, providing an empirical validation of this conceptualization. Finally, four ITs originally identified for contact sex offenders were also identified, namely, Uncontrollability, Child as Sexual Being, Dangerous World, and Nature of Harm. Further validation of CSEM-related ITs is encouraged.

Criminological differences between child pornography offenders arrested in Spain.

BACKGROUND: Lack of studies on CP offenders from non-English speaking countries motivated the analysis of the profile of adult men arrested in Spain for such crimes (N = 347). OBJECTIVE: The current study examined differences between groups of CP users according to their criminal history (i.e., CP-only offenders, CP offenders with other nonviolent or non-sexually violent crimes, and dual offenders). METHODS: Analyses of case investigation files were performed across seven key areas: (1) sociodemographic characteristics, (2) criminological data, (3) characteristics of index CP offending, (4) characteristics of CP collections, (5) access to children, (6) indication of pedophilic or hebephilic interests, and (7) recidivism outcomes. RESULTS: CP-only offenders presented with fewer prior criminal records and lower general (6.7%) and violent (1.1%) recidivism rates. They were also less likely to be arrested for CP production, although they had greater access to children living in their residence. CP offenders with other nonviolent or non-sexually violent crimes exhibited characteristics on a continuum between the other two groups. Dual offenders were more likely to have prior criminal records for sexual offenses and higher sexual recidivism rates (16.7%). 55.6% had produced their own CP material, and they were more likely to have content depicting boys. They were also more likely to admit or be diagnosed with pedophilic/hebephilic interests, and they also had the largest proportion of legal child-related content (72.2%). CONCLUSIONS: Authors conclude there are significant differences between dual and CP-only offenders which suggests a need for specialized treatment and risk assessment tools.