ABSTRACT
A national victimization survey completed in the United States in 2005 with a sample of over 2,000 children aged two to 17 years revealed that one in 12 children had experienced sexual victimization during childhood (Finkelhor, Ormrod, Turner, & Hamby, 2005). Of these victimizations, the great majority were perpetrated by offenders known to the victim. This is consistent with previous studies (Finkelhor, 1994; U.S. Department of Justice, 2002). Indeed, it has been suggested that 75–80% of child sexual abuse occurs within a context in which the offender and the victim know each other very well; this includes cases of father–daughter incest and abuse committed by step-relatives and authority figures (Finkelhor, 1984; Russell, 1983).
