Hypothesis 2:
Childhood Sexual Experiences Inevitably
Lead to Long-Term Neutral Effects
Primarily neutral effects were found in 14 of the 34 studies
reviewed here.
Rasmussen (1934)
This Norwegian study of 54 sexual
assault cases involving children from 9-13 years of age, which were selected
from court records, focused on adult mental health and social adjustment.
Victims had been medically examined and the offender convicted. There was no
control group with this offender population. As mentioned previously, we do
not know exactly what the evidence was that led to Rasmussen's conclusion that
85% seemed none the worse for the experience. However, this early study provided
much needed information on an offender population which has been used to
compare results from other descriptive studies and shows a trend. It does not
present conclusive evidence.
Bender and Grugett (1952)
Social and psychiatric follow-up information was collected on 14 adults who as children, 11 and 16
years previously, had been referred for psychiatric attention by a
children's court because of various and prolonged sexual experiences. The
authors' conclusion that there exists no scientific proof that there are any
resulting deleterious effects must be tempered by the knowledge that the small
population studied was clinical and there was no control group.
Landis (1956)
Of the 1,800 university students from middle- to upper-class backgrounds who completed questionnaires for this
study, 500 were
found to have had childhood experiences with adults. The authors' conclusion
that "the great majority of the victims seemed to have few permanently
harmful effects from the experiences" (p. 108) can be accepted based on the
clear definition of terms, large number of
[Page 189]
cases studied, use of a large control group, a non-clinical
& non-offender population, and acceptable measures of consequences. He did combine
age groups (4-19 plus years), however, and his findings could not be generalized to lower-class populations.
Brunold (1964)
The information for Brunold's Netherlands study of 62 sexual assault cases from
court records was gathered by personal and third person interviews at least 15
years after the offense. There was no control group, and an offender population
was used.
His conclusion that lasting "psychological" injury as a
result of sexual assaults suffered in infancy is not very common can be questioned in
several years. [?ways?]
First, he admittedly did not consider personality in his measures
of consequences but based his conclusions on background, education, later
occupation, and marital relationships, not psychological aspects.
Second, his
use of the term "infancy" is dubious since all his cases were from 5
to 15 years of age at the time of the offense. *
* The inappropriate use of terms could be due to inaccurate
translation from the original language.
Gagnon (1956)
Gagnon studied the 333 women who reported a
sexual experience with an adult before age 13 in the Kinsey study by structured
interviews. His use of a control group, large number of cases, clear definition
of terms, and specific measures of consequences make his finding that
"only 5% could be considered to have adult lives that had been severely
damaged for whatever reason" (p. 188) acceptable. It must be remembered,
however, that his population was primarily college-educated women, and it is
a retrospective study.
Lukianowicz (1972)
This was an Irish study of 55 incest
cases with lower-class backgrounds found in a general hospital. Information
was obtained by psychotherapy interviews. No control group was used. The finding that "the incestuous
activities seemed to have been only a transitory, culturally permissable phase
in the process of their
normal Psychosexual development, and as such did not result in any bad
effects" (p. 312) may need to be limited to this particular culture and to
a lower-class, clinical population.
Herman and Hirschman (1977)
These authors studied 15
"father-daughter" incest cases where the victims were later seen in
psychotherapy. Their use of the term "father-daughter" is misleading because three stepfathers, a grandfather, a brother-in-law, and
an uncle were included. Herman and Hirschman observed that "nothing
[Page 190]
obvious distinguished them from the general population of women
entering psychotherapy" and that "the severity of their complaints seemed
to be related to the degree of family disorganization and deprivation in their
histories rather than to the incest history per se" (p. 745). The familiar
sampling trilogy of a few cases, no control groups, and a clinical population,
plus the loose definition of terms and descriptive measures of consequences,
make these findings questionable. They can only discern a trend.
Goodwin, Simms, and Bergman (1979)
In a study similar to that of Gross (1979), Goodwin et al. describe six cases in which adolescents
developed hysterical seizures after parental incest. A difference is that Gross'
subjects experienced incest as adolescents whereas Goodwin et al.'s subjects
experienced incest below the age of 10, and the seizures disappeared after
psychotherapeutic exploration of the incestuous experience. This descriptive
study raises questions for further investigation.
Symonds, Mendoza, and Harrell (1981)
The 109 cases of
incest were self-identified in response to advertisements in newspapers and
studied by phone interviews. Respondents were middle-class and, overwhelmingly,
white males. This sampling bias, plus no control group and only descriptive
measures of consequences, make the author's conclusions applicable only to
white, middle-class self-selected males in Los Angeles. A more sophisticated
analysis of data would have been helpful.
Nelson (1981)
The findings of this exploratory, descriptive
study on incest were based on survey data from 100 persons who responded to classified advertisements in periodicals. The majority were middleclass, male,
and from San Francisco and the Bay area. A high proportion were homosexuals,
and ages at time of incest ranged from 3-up years. The lack of a
control group, a biased, self-selected sample, the combination of children and
adult experiences, and the large number of homosexual males cause the findings to
be questionable, although trends may be discerned.
Finkelhor (1981)
Finkelhor used questionnaires to study 796 college students, 114 of which had sibling sexual experiences, in a
predominantly white, middle-class sample. He used comparison groups and separated the sample by ages at time of the experience for
purposes of analysis. He included "an invitation to do something
sexual" as a sexual experience and also included step-sibling and
half-siblings, which could skew his findings somewhat. He did not, however, use
the value-laden term of "victimization" in relation to sibling sex
as he does in
[Page 191]
relation to other older partners. Although he had three limited
indicators of adult sexual behavior, his study was, admittedly, not well equipped to grapple with outcomes. He did move beyond the
typical descriptive conclusions regarding outcome to statistical analyses,
however. His finding that there is little reason to think that sibling sexual
experiences are influential for adult sexual functioning should be considered as
evidence.
Fritz, Stoll and Wagner (1981)
This study of 952 college
students through questionnaires used comparison groups, well-defined terms, and
separated the sexes for purposes of analysis of prepubescent sex play. A strength of
this study was that some parametric statistical measures were used for measures
of consequences. A limitation was that only adult sexual adjustment was studied.
Fritz et al. found that 1,8% of all females have problems with adult sexual
adjustment arising from prepubertal molestation and that molested males and
females differ significantly in regard to long-term effects on sexual attitudes
and relationships. This study did meet our scientific criteria, and the findings
should be considered.
Emslie and Rosenfeld (1983)
These authors compared 7 incest
cases with a control group of 19 cases, all of whom were hospitalized for
psychiatric problems. Definitions were clear, and the use of a control group
made possible the comparison of effects. No difference was reported. However,
the small number of cases, use of a clinical population, the combining of age
groups, and no specificity of socio-economic class were given. No generalizations
could be made from the finding.
Kilpatrick (1986)
Kilpatrick used a deliberate sample in
order to increase heterogeneity in her study of the childhood (0-14 years)
sexual experiences of 501 predominantly middle-class women. Women with childhood sexual experiences were compared with those who had no
such experiences. Her terms were well defined. A primary strength of this study
was that the researcher utilized quite sophisticated analytic procedures, such
as hierarchical multiple regression analyses, in order to determine long-term
effects on five different measures of present adult functioning. With this type
of procedure, factors such as background variables could be controlled.
Her
findings were that adult functioning of women who had childhood sexual
experiences and those who had none did not differ significantly. However, sexual
experiences that were abusive, forced, guilt-producing, harmful, or pressured interacting with the type partner (parents, other relative,
non-relative) were significant for all measures of adult functioning except for the
sexual satisfaction scale. Her findings should be considered.
[Page 192]
Studies Supporting Hypothesis 2 by Scientific Criteria
Author
|
N
|
Population
|
Clear definition
|
Control group
|
Age group
|
SEC group
|
Specific measures
|
Landis
|
500 |
Students |
yes |
yes
|
4-19+ |
MC + UC |
yes |
Gagnon
|
333 |
Women |
yes |
yes |
0-13 |
MC |
yes |
Finkelhor
|
796 |
Students |
yes |
yes |
3-19 |
MC + UC |
yes |
Fritz. et al.
|
952 |
Students |
yes |
yes |
Pre-
pubertal |
MC |
yes |
Kilpatrick
|
501 |
Women |
yes |
yes |
0-14 |
MC |
yes |
Five of the 14 studies which found primarily long-term
neutral effects met enough of the scientific criteria to be given serious
consideration. These studies are shown in Table 3. Three of these studies have
been reported since 1981. The state of our knowledge regarding hypothesis 2 can
be summarized as follows:
 |
1. College students from middle-class families show few
permanently harmful effects from childhood sexual experiences with adults (Landis. 1956). |
 |
2. Only a small number of middle-class women show severe damage
from prepubertal sexual experiences with adults (Gagnon. 1965). |
 |
3. Sibling sexual experiences in middle-class families have
little influence on adult sexual functioning (Finkelhor. 1981 ). |
 |
4. A small percentage of middle-class females and a
significantly smaller percentage of males who have experienced prepubertal
molestation have problems with adult sexual adjustment (Fritz et al., 1981). |
 |
5. The adult functioning of middle-class females who have or
have not had childhood sexual experiences does not differ significantly.
However, the interactions of negative childhood sexual experiences with the type
partner were found to be statistically significant for four measures of adult
functioning (Kilpatrick. 1986). |
These findings do not support the hypothesis that childhood
sexual experiences inevitably lead to long-term neutral effects.
|