ABSTRACT
Children and adolescents who engage in sexually abusive behaviour represent a significant problem in modern western society (Barbaree, Marshall and Hudson, 1993; Ryan and Lane, 1997). Official US data for the year 2000 indicate that 16 per cent of arrests for forcible rape and 19 per cent of arrests for sexual offences (excluding forcible rape) were arrests of juveniles (US Department of Justice, 2002). Data for the years 1991 to 1996 reveal that 23 per cent of sexual offenders against children were themselves under eighteen years of age, with juveniles representing 40 per cent of those offending against victims aged under six and 39 per cent of those offending against victims aged six to eleven (Snyder, 2000). Prevalence rates are similarly disconcerting, with estimates ranging from 1.5 to 16 sexual assaults per 1,000 male juveniles (Ageton, 1983; James and Neil, 1996). Sexually abusive behaviour begins at an early age in these individuals and progresses from less to more serious acts. Burton (2000) found that 45 per cent of his sample of adolescent sexual offenders reported sexual offending before the age of twelve, with progression from less intrusive to penetrative acts. Eighty-seven per cent of juveniles convicted of a contact sexual offence admit to prior noncontact sexual offences (Wieckowski et al., 1998). Importantly, juvenile sexual crimes set the stage for adult sexual crimes, since many adult sexual offenders engaged in sexually abusive behaviour as children or adolescents (Abel et al., 1985; Knight and Prentky, 1993), and many report the onset of paraphilias by the age of eighteen (Abel et al., 1993).
