Young People's Perceptions of Sexual Assault in Residential Care: "It Does Happen a Lot".

The Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse (the Royal Commission) examined child sexual abuse within a wide range of institutions that provide services to children, this included residential facilities. The current study (funded by the Royal Commission) considers young people's perception of safety in residential care; specifically, the current study attended to the voices of young people who spoke about sexual harassment and assault in qualitative interviews. Interviews were conducted with young people aged between 13 and 21 years who were or had recently been in residential care. Participants were asked for their perceptions of situations in a series of vignettes describing various levels and types of sexual assault and harassment. During these interviews, the young people in this study voluntarily reported known incidences of sexual assault and harassment in varying levels, perpetrated by workers, individuals outside of residential care, and peers within residential care. Sexual assault and harassment was discussed in heteronormative and gendered ways with young men seen as perpetrators and protectors, and young women seen as being vulnerable. Further, it was evident from this study, that there were varying responses to these situations from workers within the residential care facilities.

Parental alienation, coaching and the best interests of the child: Allegations of child sexual abuse in the Family Court of Australia.

BACKGROUND: Allegations of child sexual abuse provide complex challenges to family court systems. OBJECTIVES: Despite being highly criticised in the academic research, this analysis examined whether and how the gendered concepts of parental alienation syndrome or parental alienation more broadly are still being used to rebut allegations of child sexual abuse in family court cases in Australia. Parental Alienation is broadly understood as the deliberate actions of one parent to disrupt and prevent children's ongoing relationships with their other parent, in this case through allegations of abuse. METHODS: We examined 357 publicly available judgements of the Family Court of Australia between 2010 and 2015. Judgements were analysed qualitatively for key themes using N-VIVO software. RESULTS: Five themes emerged in the data, including use of the concept of parental alienation, coaching, mothers as manipulative, mothers as mentally ill, and impact of the best interest of the child. CONCLUSIONS: Results indicate that judgements made in the Family Court of Australia are both similar and divergent from those made in other jurisdictions internationally. The complexity of responding to allegations of child sexual abuse for parents is discussed.