Rape: Psychopathology, theory and treatment

Child Abuse & Neglect, 2008

Objective: The aim of this study is to identify the distinct developmental experiences associated with child sexual abuse and rape. Method: For 269 sexual offenders (137 rapists and 132 child sexual abusers), developmental experiences were recorded from a behavioral checklist, a parental-bonding survey, and a sexual history questionnaire. Offender classification was obtained from official records and verified through polygraph examinations. Results: Compared to rapists, child sexual abusers reported more frequent experiences of child sexual abuse (73%), early exposure to pornography (65% before age 10), an earlier onset of masturbation (60% before age 11), and sexual activities with animals (38%). In contrast to child sexual abusers, rapists reported more frequent experiences of physical abuse (68%), parental violence (78%), emotional abuse (70%), and cruelty to animals (68%). Both child sexual abusers and rapists (>93%) reported frequent exposure to violent media during their childhood. Most offenders (94%) described having insecure parental attachment bonds; 76% of rapists reported avoidant parental attachments and 62% of child sexual abusers reported anxious parental attachments. Conclusions: Findings from this study support the role of specific developmental experiences as etiological factors in differential sexual offending. Child sexual abusers' developmental histories were characterized by heightened sexuality; whereas rapists' childhood histories were more indicative of violence. These findings have implications for the treatment of sexual abusers and the prevention of sexual abuse. Practice implications: This study's findings suggest that sexual offenders have been socialized to satisfy human needs of intimacy and sexuality through maladaptive means, which implies that a risk management approach may not be sufficient treatment. Although risk models teach offenders skills to avoid high-risk situations, they fail to address the maladaptive strategies that they may have developed for satisfying needs. Instead, the focus of treatment should be to equip offenders with the knowledge, skills, and opportunities to achieve these needs in an acceptable manner. Thus, this model will provide these individuals with the opportunity to live a healthy life without sexual offending.

Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 2001

Polaschek et al. / RAPISTS' OFFENSE PROCESSES Models of the offense process set out to provide a description of the cognitive, behavioral, motivational, and contextual factors associated with a particular type of offense. They model the temporal relationships between the variables of interest and focus explicitly on the proximal causes or the how of offending. In this study, qualitative analysis was used to develop a descriptive model of the offense process for 24 adult rapists. Sentenced offenders provided detailed retrospective descriptions of their thoughts, emotions, and behavior prior to and during their most recent rape. These descriptions were analyzed using a grounded theory approach. The resulting preliminary model contained the following six phases: background factors to the offense, goal formation, approach behavior, offense preparation, the offense, and postoffense behavior. These stages are discussed along with the model's theoretical, research, and clinical implications. The model is consistent with existing multivariate theories of rape and has clear taxonomic potential.

Rape is costly to survivors and to society. It is essential that we develop optimal prevention and early intervention programs and policies to reduce its occurrence. The first step toward this goal is to identify the behaviors, traits, developmental experiences, and biological antecedents that have been found to be associated with an increased probability that a male will become sexually aggressive. This article briefly reviews this literature and attempts to identify the gaps in our knowledge that must be addressed to develop effective prevention programs. We speculate about the general parameters of interventions that the existing evidence suggests are likely to be successful in decreasing the probability that a male will become sexually aggressive. We also argue that current rape prevention programs might be suboptimal because they fail to encompass the complex of traits that cause sexual aggression, and primary prevention efforts must focus on the latter. A more extensive exposition of these issues can be found in Knight and Sims-Knight (in press).

California Law Review, 1999

Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 1993

Sexual contact without voluntary consent that violates a person’s sense of autonomy, control and mastery over their body constitutes sexual assault. It is increasingly recognized that many patients in primary settings have a history of sexual abuse. Demographics of sexual violence are usually obtained from crime records, hospital data, nongovernmental organizations and survey carried out for research. It is believed that these data underestimate the actual magnitude of the problem of sexual violence. In this paper we review the psychological aspects of rape and its consequences including rape trauma syndrome, posttraumatic stress disorder, depression, anxiety, sleep disorders, memory and sexuality. Further research is necessary to better understand the pathogenesis of psychiatric disorders in survivors of sexual assault. Research is also needed to determine evidence based management of survivors of sexual abuse coping with long-term mental health outcomes.

Clinical Psychology Review, 1999

In the past decade, research into the etiology of rape has increasingly focused on cognitive variables. The studies reviewed in the present article provide evidence that men with a high proclivity to rape have more rape supportive attitudes, are more likely to consider victims to be responsible for rape, and are less knowledgeable about the negative impact of rape on the victims. These men tend to misperceive cues emitted by women in heterosocial interactions; fail to generate inhibitory self-verbalizations to suppress association of sex and aggression; and have more coercive, sexual fantasies. Furthermore, a high proclivity to rape is associated with a semantic network in which concepts of sex and power are closely linked in such a way that power cues are necessary precursors of sexual feelings. Multivariate studies suggest that rape-supportive attitudes interact with noncognitive factors in the etiology of rape. Implications for rape prevention and treatment of rapists are considered. Finally, methodological issues are discussed, and recommendations for future research are given. © 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd SEVERAL EPIDEMIOLOGICAL studies indicate an alarming prevalence of rape. In North American samples of college students (e.g., and in community samples (e.g., , about one in four women report to have been the victim of a rape or an attempted rape. About 15% of male college students report to have attempted at least once to have intercourse with an unwilling female (Koss et al.,

Psychology of Women Section Review, 2011

Psychol Behav Sci Int J, 2017

International Journal of Advanced Studies in Sexology, 2021

The rationalization used by rapists to justify their criminal behavior are a risk factor for relapse. The modification of cognitive distortions is a therapeutic purpose for rehabilitation (Someda, 2009). Using Rape Scale (Bumby, 1996) we evaluated the participants' (N = 480, 57 convicted rapists, 223 students non-rapists) level of cognitive distortions related to rape. Using ANOVA we identified differences between convicted rapists, psychology or law students and polytechnic students (F(3,461) = 60,69, .000, η2p = 0.283). In line with previous research (Bell, Kuriloff & Lottes, 1994), men are more lenient with rapists, accept more justifications about rape and blame the victim more. We identified differences between male and female participants and between male students and convicted rapists (F(2,477) = 98,88, .000, η2p = .293).This research brings new evidence for the importance of cognitive restructuring for implicit cognitive distortions. We discuss possible limitations and directions for future research.

Behaviour Research and Therapy, 1994

Some studies have suggested that phallometrically derived rape indices can differentiate groups of rapists and non-offenders.

Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 2005

During the past 20 years, researchers have documented the widespread problem of rape in American society. Approximately one in four women are raped in their adult lifetime, which causes severe psychological distress and long-term physical health problems. The impact of sexual assault extends far beyond rape survivors as their family, friends, and significant others are also negatively affected. Moreover, those who help rape victims, such as rape victim advocates, therapists, as well as sexual assault researchers, can experience vicarious trauma. Future research and advocacy should focus on improving the community response to rape and the prevention of sexual assault.

Feminism & Psychology, 2001

The study used a discursive approach to explore the rape narratives of a convicted rapist. These narratives were recounted during the group therapy sessions of a prison-based Sex Offender Treatment Programme (SOTP). The analysis suggested that the offender drew on two main practical ideologies in recounting his version(s) of the rape. These practical ideologies, which often embodied popular rape myths, served to construct the incident as ambiguous. In particular, this ambiguity called into question whether the incident constituted rape or consensual sexual intercourse. These findings lend support to feminist writers' assertions that there is no clear distinction between rape and sex. The implications of the research for sex offender treatment programmes are discussed.

Psychiatry, Psychology and Law, 2014

Rape trauma syndrome (RTS) was first described by who argued that there was little information that described the physical and psychological effects of rape, associated therapy and provisions for protection of the victim from further psychological harm. Since then, there have been several critiques of RTS and empirical evidence exists that RTS is not generally accepted by the relevant scientific community. Despite this, RTS is still used in courts. As such, in this article, we comprehensively evaluated RTS and determined that it is vague and imprecise, its evidential status is questionable, it is inconsistent with the most common sequelae of trauma, it ignores important mediating variables and it may not be culturally sensitive. In light of these critiques, we recommend no further use of this model in courts or in clinical practice.

Psychology, Crime & Law, 2013

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