erally considered to be coercive even when actual physical violence or the threat of violence is not present. This is because children are regarded as lacking the competency to make informed, independent decisions with respect to sexual behaviors and because most adult perpetrators of sexual abuse are seen by children as domineering authority figures who can "command" their behavior. Thus, whether the victim of sexual abuse is male or female and whether the sexual abuse includes penetration or not, Duncan and Williams (p. 767) believe that few victims of childhood sexual abuse escape the trauma without some form of both short-term and long-term psychological trauma. More often than not, males and females sexually abused as children are more likely than their non-abused peers to have negative self-perceptions and low self-esteem are.
Molnar, Buka, and Kessler (p. 753) drew upon a National Comorbidity Survey to examine the relationship between child sexual abuse and subsequent onset of psychiatric disorders. Their research attempted to account for other childhood adversities, the type of sexual abuse that occurred, and the chronicity of the abuse. The study involved a nationally representative survey of some 5,877 American adults. Molnar, et al (p. 753) found that among this sample, childhood sexual abuse was reported by 13.5 percent of the female subjects and 2.5 percent of the male subjects. These figures, which do not correspond with those reported by Duncan and Williams (p. 765), reflect the fact that definitions of sexual abuse vary from one jurisdiction to another and the fact that many incidents of sexual abuse of children are not reported even years after the abuse occurred and had ended.
Molnar, et al (p. 753) also found that when other childhood adversities among members of their sample were accounted for, significant associations were found between a history of childhood sexual abuse and the subsequent onset of 1...