Competing Discourses about Youth Sexual Exploitation in Canadian News Media.

Media holds the power to create, maintain, or break down stigmatizing attitudes, which affect policies, funding, and services. To understand how Canadian news media depicts the commercial sexual exploitation of children and youth, we examined 835 Canadian newspaper articles from 1989-2008 using a mixed methods critical discourse analysis approach, comparing representations to existing research about sexually exploited youth. Despite research evidence that equal rates of boys and girls experience exploitation, Canadian news media depicted exploited youth predominantly as heterosexual girls, and described them alternately as victims or workers in a trade, often both in the same story. News media mentioned exploiters far less often than victims, and portrayed them almost exclusively as male, most often called 'customers' or 'consumers,' and occasionally 'predators'; in contrast, research has documented the majority of sexually exploited boys report female exploiters. Few news stories over the past two decades portrayed the diversity of victims, perpetrators, and venues of exploitation reported in research. The focus on victims but not exploiters helps perpetuate stereotypes of sexual exploitation as business or a 'victimless crime,' maintains the status quo, and blurs responsibility for protecting youth under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. Health care providers and researchers can be advocates for accuracy in media coverage about sexual exploitation; news reporters and editors should focus on exploiters more than victims, draw on existing research evidence to avoid perpetuating stereotypes, and use accurate terms, such as commercial sexual exploitation, rather than terms related to business or trade.

Narratives of dissociation: insights into the treatment of dissociation in individuals who were sexually abused as children.

This article provides an in-depth understanding of the treatment of dissociation from the perspective of 7 individuals who have a history of childhood sexual abuse and engage in moderate to high levels of dissociative behavior. Levels of dissociation were screened using the Dissociative Experiences Scale (E. Bernstein-Carlson & F. Putnam, 1993), and individual interviews were conducted to gain insight into how dissociation can best be treated in a therapeutic context. From a narrative research design with a holistic-content analysis (A. Lieblich, R. Tuval-Mashiach, & T. Zilber, 1998), 3 major themes and 16 subthemes were revealed. The major themes included (a) identifying specific tools and techniques that were recognized as critical in managing dissociative symptoms, (b) challenging the dominant medical paradigm by underscoring the importance of helping clients contextualize and normalize dissociative behavior, and (c) highlighting specific characteristics of the therapeutic relationship that create the necessary trust and safety to facilitate reparation. A detailed description of the 3 major themes and 16 subthemes is provided. Implications for both clinical theory and practice are identified.