Childhood Sexual Abuse and Incest: Psychological and Legal Definitions 5
Childhood Sexual Abuse and Incest: Age of the Victim 8
Childhood Sexual Abuse and Incest: Prevalence Rates 11
Organization of the Remainder of the Dissertation 22
Family Structure and Family Dynamics 26
Theories that focus on causative conditions 38
Theories that focus on the victim 43
Psychological/Psychosocial Remedies 69
CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 84
Conclusions Related to Research Question One 84
Conclusions Related to Research Question Two 85
Conclusions Related to Research Question Three 87
This study examined the empirical research on different types and kinds of programs developed to remediate incest and childhood sexual abuse. The primary methods used to obtain data were the literary search and document analysis. Specifically, the researcher conducted an exhaustive search of diverse printed sources (books, journal articles, reports, etc.) in order to obtain a representative sampling of the incest/childhood sexual abuse literature in seven areas.
Examined areas were: (1) incidence of incest/childhood sexual abuse; (2) age and gender of victims; (3) characteristics of incest and sexual abuse offenders; (4) family structure and dynamics of incestuous homes; (5) consequences of the abuse for victims; (6) theoretical explanations of both incest and its consequences to victims; (7) types and kinds of remediation programs offered; and (8) the relative effectiveness levels of each type and kind of program
Information obtained in the first six areas was presented to provide a context within which to better understand the information on types and kinds of programs as well as their relative effectiveness. Findings of the study indicated that, in general, most programs were relatively ineffective. However, this conclusion can only be considered tentative due to the fact that much of the li...