Police officer attitudes to the practicalities of the sex offenders’ register,ViSOR and Child Sexual Abuse Disclosure Scheme in England and Wales

This paper examines police officer understandings of and attitudes to the sex offenders’ register, Violent and Sex Offenders’ Register (ViSOR) and Child Sexual Offender Disclosure Scheme (CSODS) in England and Wales – an under-researched area in the management of sexual offenders in the UK. This research is an adaptation of an American study utilising a mixed-methods approach, combining an online questionnaire survey (N?=?227) with a series of semi-structured interviews (N?=?27). The study found that police officers, irrespective of role, were generally supportive of the register, ViSOR and CSODS in principle, but they thought that logistics, practicalities, infrastructure, multi-agency collaboration and public understandings had problematic impacts on the scheme in practice. The participants believed that greater investment was needed in terms of time and resource to make the register, ViSOR and CSODS easier to use and access and thus fit for purpose.     

A qualitative analysis of nonoffending partners’ experiences and perceptions following a psychoeducational group intervention

The present research is a qualitative study analysing therapeutic letters written by the nonoffending partners of men who have perpetrated child sexual abuse, after completion of a psychoeducational group intervention. It sought to identify themes relating to their experiences post-intervention. Findings indicated that the intervention contributed to women having increased insight into sexual offending, and feeling more confident and empowered. In addition, they displayed an awareness of risk issues, and an intention to play a role in helping to manage their partner’s future risk. Implications for research and clinical practice are discussed.     

Preventing child sexual abuse through education: the work of Stop it Now! Wales

This paper presents the findings from an evaluation of education and awareness-raising programmes delivered by Stop it Now! Wales, aimed at engaging parents, carers and professionals in an informed discourse about child sexual abuse (CSA) and how to prevent it. Crucially, the findings presented in this paper show that the majority of research participants saw benefits in attending a programme. However, this varied by the type of programme attended and the nature of the impact reported. These variations are discussed in order to contribute to our understanding about how CSA issues are experienced and understood by parents and professionals; how they experience the transition of new knowledge; and what, if any, preventative action is taken by parents and professionals as a result of attending a Stop it Now! Wales CSA education and awareness-raising programme.     

The role of Title IV-E education and training in child protection workforce diversification

ABSTRACT

Educating, training, and diversifying the workforce are strategies that may help reduce racial/ethnic disparities that plague child protection system (CPS). Title IV-E education and training programs support the development of a specially trained, highly skilled workforce; yet, little research examining their impact on workforce diversification exists. The current study assessed the relationship between Title IV-E education and training and workforce diversity and leadership in a state system that is plagued with racial disparities using data from a statewide child welfare survey (n = 679) and existing population-level sources. Findings revealed that while children of color were disproportionately overrepresented in the CPS, professionals of color were disproportionately underrepresented (as compared to the state’s overall population and the population of children served within CPS). Title IV-E education and training programs were associated with both child protection workforce diversity and CPS leadership roles. Implications for recruitment, retention, education, and partnership are discussed.     

Factors affecting turnover rates of public child welfare front line workers: comparing cohorts of title IV-E program graduates with regularly hired and trained staff

ABSTRACT

The purpose of the study is to examine the impact of a statewide intervention (BSW level Title IV-E Program) on both the workers’ intent to leave the job and their actual exit from a state administered public child welfare agency. Employees completed an extensive survey including scales assessing individual, team, and organizational variables that might impact turnover. Results show that more Title IV-E graduates stay with the agency than do regular hires and leave at a slower rate. Different variables impact intent to leave compared to actual exit and vary across type of employee. Implications for the workforce are discussed.     

Informed powerlessness: child marriage interventions and Third World girlhood discourses

Child marriage has gained increased international prominence over the past decades. Organisations working with the issue have promoted empowering girls as the best strategy to address it. Informed by postcolonial feminist theory, this article will locate these discourses in broader ‘turn to the girl’ and ‘turn to agency’ in international development, analysing how Third World girlhood, agency, resistance and voice are conceptualised. Girls are constructed as threatened by their families and communities, with agency exercised through resistance and materialised by their voice. I argue that this ignores the complexity of decision-making processes and broader structural factors related to child marriage, so that interventions providing ‘empowerment-as-information’ for girls to be agents of change instead leave them in a state of informed powerlessness.     

The detection of deception with the reality monitoring approach: a review of the empirical evidence

One of the verbal approaches to the detection of deceit is based on research on human memory that tries to identify the characteristics that differentiate between internal and external memories (reality monitoring). This approach has attempted to extrapolate the contributions of reality monitoring (RM) research to the deception area. In this paper, we have attempted to review all available studies conducted in several countries in order to yield some general conclusions concerning the discriminative power of this approach. Regarding individual criteria, the empirical results are not very encouraging: few criteria discriminate significantly across studies, and there are several variables that moderate their effect. Some of the contradictory findings may have emerged because of differences in the operationalizations and procedures used across individual studies. However, more promising results have been reported in recent studies, and the approach as a whole appears to discriminate above chance level, reaching accuracy rates that are similar to those of criteria-based content analysis (CBCA). Some suggestions for future research are made.     

Mock jurors’ perceptions of a child witness: the impact of the presence and/or intervention of a registered intermediary during cross-examination

ABSTRACT

In recent years Registered Intermediaries (RIs) have been involved in facilitating communication in children's investigative interviews and trial proceedings. Their presence and interventions are generally deemed to have a positive impact on child engagement, but their impact on jury appraisal of evidence, during cross-examination is unclear. This study addressed this issue in a more ecologically valid context than that previously used. Adult mock juror participants (N?=?217) watched a video-recording of a mock cross-examination of a child witness in which a RI was present or absent, and in which RI type interventions were either included or omitted. The participants rated the quality of the cross-examination and the child's responses in relation to child credibility, child understanding, legal professional's behaviour, and trial progression. Findings indicated that RI presence or absence, and inclusion or omission of interventions had no effect on mock juror ratings. However, an interaction between these variables demonstrated that mock jurors rated trial progression towards a guilty verdict according to which court professional did, or did, not intervene. The findings also demonstrated that mock jurors based their assessment of trial progression towards a guilty verdict on the evidence presented, and that child understanding per se was irrelevant.     

Sentencing in child sexual assault cases: factors influencing judicial decision-making

Abstract

To date, there has been limited examination of variables that influence sentencing in child sexual abuse cases. This study examines the extent to which offence characteristics (such as the number of offences, number and age of victims), the behaviour and perceived credibility of the victim impact upon both sentence length and the setting of earliest parole dates. Analyses conducted using data from 66 adjudicated cases of child sexual assault from the County Court of Victoria, Australia revealed that longer sentences were handed down to offenders who had perpetrated multiple offences, or who had committed offences against younger children. Lower levels of victim credibility were associated with shorter sentences and earlier parole dates for offenders, which were also associated with the presence of more harmful behavioural indicators of abuse. The findings are discussed regarding the importance of presenting evidence about the behaviour of victims following sexual abuse in criminal trials.     

Gaze patterns to child figures reflect deviant sexual preference in child sex offenders—a first glance

Abstract

Research on non-offending heterosexual participants has indicated that men's gaze allocation reflects their sexual preference. In this exploratory pilot study we investigated whether naturalistic gaze behaviour is sensitive to deviant sexual preferences. We compared gaze patterns of convicted heterosexual child sex offenders (CSOs; n = 13) with female victims to heterosexual non-offending men (n = 13) in a task of free-viewing images of clothed male and female figures aged 10, 20 and 40 years. CSOs dedicated more fixations to the upper body of the female child than male child figures. The pattern was different for the control sample, whose gaze pattern to male and female figures could only be differentiated when viewing adult figures. CSOs showed significantly greater difference in their gaze towards the upper body of male and female children than non-offenders. Our findings provide preliminary evidence for eye-tracking as a potential method of assessing deviant sexual interest.