Learn More About Child Abuse

What is Child Sexual Abuse?

Child sexual abuse happens when an adult or another child involves a child in sexual activities for their own pleasure or to satisfy someone watching. This abuse can involve physical contact, like touching, or non-contact actions. Child sexual abuse can happen to any child—regardless of their age, race, background, or where they live. It affects both girls and boys and occurs in all types of communities.

Source: The National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN)

What might child sexual abuse look like?

Examples of abusive physical contact:

• Touching a child’s genitals or private parts for sexual purposes
• Making a child touch someone else’s genitals or play sexual games
• Putting objects or body parts (like fingers, tongue or penis) inside the vagina, in the mouth or in the anus of a child for sexual purposes

Examples of non-contact sexual abuse:

• Showing pornography to a child
• Deliberately exposing one’s genitals to a child
• Photographing a child in sexual poses
• Encouraging a child to watch or hear sexual acts
• Inappropriately watching a child undress or use the bathroom

Sexual Abuse Material

There is a growing and serious issue involving people creating, sharing, and downloading sexual images of children online. Viewing these abusive images not only causes harm—it also fuels and encourages more abuse. It can lead some people to wrongly believe that sexual acts involving children are acceptable.

For survivors, knowing that images of their abuse are still being shared can be incredibly painful and traumatic.

We now understand that much of this exploitation is happening within families or by people the child knows and trusts—like parents, babysitters, or older siblings. These images are often created to share with partners, strangers online, or under pressure and threats. This makes the abuse even more devastating, as it often comes from those meant to protect the child.

Source: The Mama Bear Effect

Signs and Symptoms to consider

Behavioral

• Lack of trust, social isolation and lack of friendships
• Nightmares
• Abrupt changes in behavior or personality
• Aggression
• “Flashbacks”
• Acts of self-mutilation or self-injury
• Suicidal thoughts or attempts
• Excessive crying
• Truancy or “Runaway” behavior
• Over compliance or submissive behavior
• Temper tantrums
• School problems such as sudden drop in grades or participation

Emotional

• Self-hate
• Obsessive ideas and thoughts
• Regression to younger development stage
• Lack of affect
• Depression and/or withdrawal
• Anxiety, fear and irritability
• Low self-esteem
• Feelings of helplessness
• Excessive guilt
• Phobias

Sexual/Physical

• Fatigue and/or exhaustion
• Enuresis (wetting of pants or the bed)
• Encopresis (soiling of pants)
• Drastic changes in appetite
• Sleep disturbances
• Hypervigilance
• Increased startle response
• Avoidance of touch
• Reluctance to undress in normal settings
• Excessive masturbatory behavior
• Detailed and age-inappropriate knowledge of sexual activity
• Sexualized play with self or others
• Attempts to touch genitals or “private areas” of others (child and/or adult)

The American Academy of Pediatrics also reports the following are also common behavior changes in victims of child sexual abuse:

• Noticeable fear of a person or certain places
• Unusual or unexpected response from the child when asked if he or she was touched by someone
• Unreasonable fear of a physical exam
• Drawings that show sexual acts
• Abrupt changes in behavior, such as bedwetting or losing control of the bowels
• Sudden awareness of genitals and sexual acts and words
• Attempting to get other children to perform sexual acts

Why Children Don’t Tell

There are many reasons why children may not tell anyone about abuse right away or even for years after it has ended. In most cases, the person who abused them used emotional and psychological manipulation to keep the child silent and in control. Children often don’t understand whether what’s happening is wrong or that they have the right to say no, especially because of their young age and limited experience. Abusers take advantage of this innocence and confusion.

Sometimes, after a child does speak up, they may take back what they said—not because it didn’t happen, but because talking about it feels overwhelming or scary. This is a common reaction to the stress of revisiting painful memories.

Here are some common reasons why child survivors didn’t disclose:

1. They do not have the language to tell because they were never taught what sexual abuse is and feel it is not something they are supposed to talk about.
2. Sexual abuse is often pleasurable to their body as an autonomic response to stimulation, and they feel ashamed and responsible.
3. They blame themselves for lacking the courage to say “no” and not disclosing immediately.
4. They fear not being believed or protected if they disclose.
5. They have been threatened with harm to themselves or someone else, or a pet, for example.
6. They were forced to harm another person or animal and feel responsible and ashamed of not being able to protect them.
7. They fear disappointing their parents – something abusers often push upon the child to believe.
8. If it is a family member, they are often afraid of disrupting the family – if a parent or other family member were to have to leave – they may wonder what their family would do.
9. The abuser holds a level of power over their education, freedom, or talent and fear the consequences of retribution (for example: a teacher, juvenile probation officer, or coach).
10. The abuser may make the victim feel responsible for satisfying their sexual needs – and possibly that if they don’t give in, another child will be targeted.
11. A specific reason for boys and men that do not report, is the fear of being perceived as homosexual or less ‘manly’ for not being able to protect themselves, especially if abuse prevention awareness is focused on females and not males as well.

Source: The Mama Bear Effect