...Research, Practice and Policy (2011) Marian Reiff, Dorothy, M. Castille, KristinaMuenzenmaier, & Bruce Link Topic of the study: Childhood Abuse and the Content of Adult Psychotic Symptom Fathimath Shafa (3249) Abnormal Psychology -PSYCHOLOGY 4501 Missouri University of Science and Technology Dr. Mojgan Shadbash Psy.D., Clinical Psychology, Germany 1. Introduction Childhood sexual abuse and childhood physical abuse have been regarded as to cause psychotic symptoms or schizophrenia. The symptoms of previous trauma starts to display in adulthood. This particular research explores the connection between childhood abuse and the content of adult psychotic symptoms. The researcher managed to explain this relationship in multiple pathways despite the complexity of the body. About 54% of the schizophrenic patients reported having sexually abused during childhood and it is important to know how the psychotic symptoms might be related to early traumatic events considering the high prevalence rate. This research accommodates some of the other researches done on this area, in one of the research, they have mentioned specific approaches that were used to investigate the association between psychotic symptoms and the two subjects. Psychotic symptoms have been linked to range of severe experiences of childhood sexual abuse such ass malevolence, sexual themes, and olfactory sensations. Moreover, it contains subordinate relationships. This research further investigates this...
Words: 1302 - Pages: 6
...Child abuse Child abuse is the physical, sexual or emotional mistreatment or neglect of a child or children. Child maltreatment as any act or series of acts of commission or omission by a parent or other caregiver that results in harm, potential for harm, or threat of harm to a child. Child abuse can occur in a child's home, or in the organizations, schools or communities the child interacts with. There are four major categories of child abuse: neglect, physical abuse, psychological/emotional abuse, and child sexual abuse. Different jurisdictions have developed their own definitions of what constitutes child abuse for the purposes of removing a child from his/her family and/or prosecuting a criminal charge. According to the Journal of Child Abuse and Neglect, child abuse is "any recent act or failure to act on the part of a parent or caretaker which results in death, serious physical or emotional harm, sexual abuse or exploitation, an act or failure to act which presents an imminent risk of serious harm". Types Child abuse can take several forms: The four main types are physical, sexual, psychological, and neglect. There are many effects of child neglect, such as children not being able to interact with other children around them. The continuous refusal of a child's basic needs is considered chronic neglect. Physical abuse Physical abuse involves physical aggression directed at a child by an adult. Most nations with child-abuse laws consider the deliberate infliction of...
Words: 3339 - Pages: 14
...HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE ON CHILDHOOD ADVERSITY Modern health research defines childhood adversity as a range of unfavorable experiences that a child may have experienced before attaining the age of 18 (Pais & Bissell, 2006). A more recent definition provided by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) describes Adverse Childhood Experience as a range of challenges, including abuse (emotional, physical and sexual), household challenges (violent treatment of the mother, household substance abuse, mental illness within household, parental separation or divorce and criminal household member) and neglect (emotional and physical) that affects a child before the age of 18 (CDC 2016). As such, the question on what defines an adverse...
Words: 2240 - Pages: 9
...Adult Survivors of Childhood Sexual Abuse | Generalist 241 | Mandie Boster | 4/21/2014 4/21/2014 There have been an increasing number of reported child abuse and child neglect cases rising in the United States. We see them in the headlines and hear of them on the news but very rarely do we hear of stories of adult survivors of child abuse and the treatment or theories that have helped them overcome the trauma. This paper will look at child sexual abuse victims and the adult survivors that have had positive outcomes after treatment or therapy. According to Karakurt and Silver (2014), “childhood sexual abuse (CSA) is any sexual abuse with a child through the use of force, threat or deceit to secure the child’s participation, or any sexual contact with a child who is incapable of consenting by virtue of age, disability, or power differential”. The Social Work Dictionary states (1995), “victims often cannot or are unwilling to understand or resist the advances of the abuser”. Child sexual abuse happens to children of every race, age, and socioeconomic background; perpetrators do not discriminate. According to an article in Healthcare Risk Management (2012), “about 95% of the reported abuse is perpetrated by someone the child knows and trust”. When children are abused by people they love and trust many times they are afraid, ashamed or do not understand how to report the abuse or to whom they should report it to. The cases that are reported are sometimes not reported...
Words: 4152 - Pages: 17
...EMPIRICAL STUDIES doi: 10.1111/j.1471-6712.2012.01049.x Repressed and silent suffering: consequences of childhood sexual abuse for women’s health and well-being Sigrun Sigurdardottir RN, MS (Director) (PhD Student)1,2 and Sigridur Halldorsdottir RN, MSN, PhD (Med Dr) (Professor and Chairman)3 1 The Icelandic Research Center Against Violence, Akureyri, Iceland, 2Public Health Sciences, School of Health Sciences, University of Iceland, Reykjavik, Iceland and 3Faculty of Graduate Studies, School of Health Sciences, University of Akureyri, Akureyri, Iceland Scand J Caring Sci; 2013; 27; 422–432 Repressed and silent suffering: consequences of childhood sexual abuse for women’s health and well-being Research results indicate that psychological trauma in childhood caused by child sexual abuse can have serious and widespread consequences for health and well-being. The purpose of this study was to examine the consequences of childhood sexual abuse for women’s health and well-being. The research methodology was phenomenology. Seven women with a history of childhood sexual abuse were interviewed twice with 1–6 months interval. For all the women, the abuse started when they were between 4 and 5. All of them were repeatedly violated and traumatized ever since then and were even still being victimized at the time of the interviews. The main result of the study is that time does not heal all wounds. All the women described great repressed and silent suffering in all aspects of...
Words: 9166 - Pages: 37
...Childhood Maltreatment to Delinquency Women account for nearly eight to ten percent of the offending population (accounting for jails, prisons, community supervision, or a combination of these) (Hanser 2006: 329). In both men and women, there are a number of variables and precursors that lead to delinquency or criminal behavior, ranging from socioeconomic status to development, and may be understood and examined through the lens of multiple theories of crime. One variable in particular, the sexual maltreatment of young girls, could in fact be a major factor of female offending in adulthood. A study conducted by the Bureau of Justice Statistics in 1999 found that female offenders are abused more frequently than male offenders. While only...
Words: 908 - Pages: 4
...Impact of Childhood Sexual Abuse Shobila Kaligounder Marymount University Introduction As per UNICEF’s (2014) definition, sexual violence against children comprises any sexual activities imposed by an adult on a child against which the child is entitled to protection by criminal law. This includes: (a) The inducement or coercion of a child to engage in any unlawful or psychologically harmful sexual activity; (b) The use of children in commercial sexual exploitation; (c) The use of children in audio or visual images of child sexual abuse; and (d) Child prostitution, sexual slavery, sexual exploitation in travel and tourism, trafficking for purposes of sexual exploitation (within and between countries), sale of children for sexual purposes and forced marriage. Sexual activities are also considered as abuse when committed against a child by another child if the offender is significantly older than the victim or uses power, threat or other means of pressure. Consensual sexual activities between children are not considered as sexual abuse if the children are older than the age limit defined by the State Party. In spite of a clear definition for child sexual abuse violence in the lives of children is so real and as an international community we do very little to protect them. There is also a dearth of data to prove the prevalence of violence due to the hidden nature of the abuse and gives a false notion that it is a rare occurrence. Children are vulnerable to sexual victimization...
Words: 3402 - Pages: 14
...After reading Jeannette Walls’ memoir, “The Glass Castle”, it became clear that there were many repetitive factors that shaped the Walls family’s lives. There are numerous accounts of sexual abuse, parental alcoholism, evidence of mental illness and finally poverty in the form of homelessness. For even when the children prospered the parents choose to be homeless. The question is, are these factors relative? Can it be that childhood sexual abuse can inflict mental illness or alcoholism in adulthood? Does mental illness and alcoholism affect the chances of being homeless? The focus of this essay is to provide evidence that the events in Walls own life, documented in her memoir, have a butterfly effect in the outcome of their parent’s lives. In Her memoir Walls documents several cases of sexual abuse during her and her sibling’s childhood. She writes of her own experiences with Billy Deel, although he is only a minor as well, he sexually assaults her during a game of hide and seek. PAGE 85-87 Afterward Jeanette was reluctant to tell her father, “I had a feeling it would cause problems” (Walls 87) The second assault Walls documents, was when she was nine years old. “I was awakened by someone running his hands over my private parts.” “‘I just want to play a game with you’ a man’s voice said.” The next day when they told their father, “he said he was going to kill that low life…” Although, no serious action was taken to find him or prevent it from happening again. (Walls...
Words: 2307 - Pages: 10
...Child Sexual Abuse – Past, Present and Future Donna Hurst University of the Cumberlands HSOL 331 April 13, 2013 ABSTRACT This paper explores the issue of child sexual abuse. Sexual abuse of a child has become a major social issue in not only the United States but the entire world. It is imperative that society learns all they can about this issue. As a whole, society needs to discover the indicators of sexual abuse, the appropriate ways to report suspected abuse and how to help those that have been abused so they are not continually victimized by their past. This paper will explore child abuse and child sexual abuse in six parts. The first part will begin with the earliest references of child abuse as a whole. The second part will continue on to the emergence of the issue of child abuse on the social and political scene. The third part of this paper will show when and how sexual abuse first became recognized as part of the child abuse issue. The fourth part of this paper will move into the effects of child sexual abuse. The fifth part will cover child sexual abuse intervention methods and the sixth part will focus on the treatments available to help victims in the present as well as the future. PART ONE: CHILD ABUSE’S PAST In the ancient world, infanticide was common practice in nearly all cultures. Children were killed at birth if they did not seem fit. Fathers were permitted to kill their newborns if they deemed the child was abnormal. Children that showed signs...
Words: 3660 - Pages: 15
...Abuse From the day that we are born the everyday events that occur in our lives play an important role on the foundation of our memory as well as our physical, mental, and emotion development. Most of us are filled with memories of a good and happy childhood, but unfortunatly that is not the case in all children. Many children undergo much abuse during their childhood. From the physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, physical neglect, emotional neglect, to that of edcational neglect, child maltreatment not only affects the child’s childhood years, it affects the indivudual’s adult life as well. Child abuse comes in many different forms and types. The one we are most familiar with is that of physical abuse. Such abuse includes deliberate acts of violence that injure children. Verbal abuse, in forms of shouting, humiliation, threats, and severe put-downs are forms of emotional abuse. Such abuse lowers individual’s self-esteem and disrupts a healthy emotional development. Another type of child abuse would be that of sexual abuse. Sexual acts of any form on a young child are all examples of child maltreatment. For victims of sexual abuse the symptoms are even more severe. A child who is the victim of prolonged sexual abuse usually develops low self- esteem, a feeling of worthlessness and an abnormal perspective on sexuality. The child may become withdrawn and mistrustful of adults, and can become suicidal. Physical and emotional neglect are...
Words: 1026 - Pages: 5
...Altruism & Society Campaign - Child Abuse The Federal Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA) defines child abuse and neglect as, at minimum: “Any recent act or failure to act on the part of a parent or caretaker which results in death, serious physical or emotional harm, sexual abuse or exploitation; or an act or failure to act which presents an imminent risk of serious harm” (Childwelfare, 2008, pg. 3).The number of confirmed reports of child abuse in 2005 is 899,000 (U.S. Department, 2007). In 2005, 12 children out of every 1,000 children up to age 18 in the United States was a victim of some form of maltreatment or abuse. Child abuse falls into six categories, some that are more self-evident such as physical abuse that leaves marks on the outside of the body and others, such as emotional, which leaves no mark save the one on the child’s heart and mind. The various forms of maltreatment for 2005 fall into the following categories: Neglect 62.8% Physical Abuse 16.6% Sexual Abuse 9.3% Emotional/psychological 7.1% Medical Neglect 2.0% Other 14.3% The listed percentages equal over 100% as children are not always the victim of just one category; regrettably, children may be the victim of both physical and emotional abuse. Studies into the cycle of abuse has shown that a person abused as a child becoming abusive as an adult, reveals “about one-third of people who are abused in childhood will become abusers themselves” ((NYTimes, 1989, pg. 1). Research...
Words: 2366 - Pages: 10
...Recent studies about the link between abuse and delinquency present a very strong case for a strong connection between childhood abuse and neglect and later delinquent and criminal behavior. It is my belief and own personal experience, from growing up in the poverty-stricken areas of Chicago, that child neglect does lead to an increased risk of delinquency. This paper will analyze multiple past and current studies regarding the topic of Child Neglect and Juvenile Delinquency. A serious consequence of child maltreatment is an increased risk for crime and violence. In addition to the direct consequences...
Words: 1319 - Pages: 6
...The present study examines the ways in which early maltreatment can negatively influence adult psychopathology. More specifically, how child abuse and neglect (physical, sexual, and emotional) can increase the chances of acquiring externalizing disorders such as antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) and psychopathy in adult criminal offenders (Dargis, Newman, & Koenigs, 2015). The study also examines the effects child abuse has on developing juvenile conduct disorder, which is the diagnostic criterion for ASPD. The researchers had three predictions: 1. childhood physical abuse would correlate with all three disorders; 2. emotional and sexual abuse would relate to CD and ASPD, but only the “lifestyle and criminal” aspects of psychopathy; 3. and...
Words: 1503 - Pages: 7
...Christine Wilson Psy1462 March 21, 2014 The Impact of Childhood Maltreatment on Young Adults’ Substance Abuse: A Reaction. This article contains information regarding a study carried out between 1976 and 1987 about individuals who were subject to different types of abuse between the ages of 10 and 17. The research seemed eager to show what the correlation was between type of abuse the child suffered through and what type of addiction, if any, that the victims acquired over the years. The study followed 842 participants through four years of initial interviews and 7 waves of re-interviewing for the purpose of seeking out addiction information. The final wave of testing, done in 1987, was when the youngest participants reached the maximum age of 24. The final total of 762 individuals whom answered every question and completed every interview was used to create the final graph regarding demographic versus addiction type. The study was split up by race, sex, age, and socio-economic background (welfare, etc.). The mediating effects of depression in later substance abuse were also discussed. Though interesting, this particular study lacks in depth. According to the results, sexual abuse plays very little role in substance abuse and I find this to be highly unlikely. I do agree that alcoholism is likely to be more prevalent in physical abuse cases. Quite often there seems to be a connection between alcohol and violence that it would seem likely would carry on into the...
Words: 607 - Pages: 3
...violator must face. The basic uncertainty of who a juvenile sex offender is can often be difficult to resolve. The fact is that demographically almost anyone has the likelihood to be a youthful offender based on physical traits alone. Currently it is estimated that juveniles account for up to one-fifth of the rapes, and one-half of the cases of child molestation committed in the United States each year (USDJJD, 2000). Reaching a statistical strategy based on demographics is nearly impossible considering that juvenile sexual offending appears to cross racial and cultural boundaries, as well as have no significance in relationship to the religious preference of the perpetrator. It is also notable that you can find juvenile offenders in all socioeconomic class levels. The statistics provided by the United States Department of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention shows little relativity between such demographic areas and the foreshadowing of who the actual perpetrators are (2000). The one demographic area that research shows as a contributing factor is that of gender. The majority of cases of juvenile sexual aggression appear to involve adolescent male perpetrators between the ages of...
Words: 2788 - Pages: 12
