Life course outcomes and developmental pathways for children and young people with harmful sexual behaviour

Hackett, Simon; Darling, Andrea J.; Balfe, Myles; Masson, Helen; Phillips, Josie

doi:10.1080/13552600.2022.2124323

Life course outcomes and developmental pathways for children and young people with harmful sexual behaviour

Hackett, Simon; Darling, Andrea J.; Balfe, Myles; Masson, Helen; Phillips, Josie

Authors

Professor Simon Hackett simon.hackett@durham.ac.uk
Professor

Andrea J. Darling

Myles Balfe

Helen Masson

Josie Phillips josephine.phillips@durham.ac.uk
Assistant Professor

Abstract

Most outcome studies for children and young people who have displayed harmful sexual behaviour have focused on sexual recidivism as their primary outcome measure. Relatively little is known about broader life outcomes for children displaying such behaviours, nor about the processes involved with longer-term developmental success or failure. This paper examines long-term life course outcomes for 69 adults in the UK who presented with abusive sexual behaviour as children. Between 10 and 20 years after their childhood sexual behaviour problems, few in the sample had sexually reoffended, but general life course outcomes were much less positive. A range of individual, relational and social/environmental factors appeared to be associated with successful and unsuccessful outcomes. Successful outcomes were associated with stable partner relationships, wider supportive relationships, and educational opportunity and achievement. The findings highlight the importance of broad-based, developmental interventions in assisting those with childhood sexual behaviour problems to live successfully.

Citation

Hackett, S., Darling, A. J., Balfe, M., Masson, H., & Phillips, J. (2024). Life course outcomes and developmental pathways for children and young people with harmful sexual behaviour. Journal of Sexual Aggression, 30(2), 145-165. https://doi.org/10.1080/13552600.2022.2124323

Journal Article Type	Article
Acceptance Date	Sep 5, 2022
Online Publication Date	Sep 21, 2022
Publication Date	2024
Deposit Date	Sep 27, 2022
Publicly Available Date	Oct 26, 2022
Journal	Journal of Sexual Aggression
Print ISSN	1355-2600
Electronic ISSN	1742-6545
Publisher	Taylor and Francis Group
Peer Reviewed	Peer Reviewed
Volume	30
Issue	2
Pages	145-165
DOI	https://doi.org/10.1080/13552600.2022.2124323
Public URL	https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1193175

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Copyright Statement
© 2022 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.