9781422276068

Understanding Child Sexual Abuse

physical abuse, but child psychologists agree that there are many, far more preferable, methods of teaching children than hitting them. The second type of abuse is emotional. Examples include verbal cruelty, humiliation, and withholding love. Every parent gets angry from time to time — after all, people make mistakes. Adults don’t cease to be flawed human beings just because they’re parents. But true emotional abuse involves deliberately inflicting emotional harm on a child. Refusing to help a child get necessary psychological help can also be a form of emotional abuse — if a child has anxiety issues, for instance, and the parent won’t let him get treatment, that could qualify as emotional abuse. Relatedly, neglect is the third type of child abuse. Rather than doing something wrong, neglect causes harm by not doing anything at all. Obvious forms of neglect include not feeding a child and not making sure a child is clean. Not taking a child to the doctor can also be a type of neglect, as can not making sure a child attends school. Neglect also can take subtler, more psychological forms, such as ignoring a child or allowing children to hurt themselves without stepping in. Last but not least is sexual abuse. Any type of sexual activity with a child is sexual abuse. It’s this type of abuse that we’ll focus on in the rest of this book. A major factor in child abuse is the power imbalance between the abuser and the child. The authority that parents have over their children is pretty self- explanatory — it’s even written into the law! Parents are called “legal guardians” because they are able to make a whole host of decisions on their children’s behalf. Other people have various forms of power over young people, too. Teachers, coaches, and school administrators certainly do. Doctors and dentists are also authority figures in a sense. Even the 15-year-old who lives next door has more “power” than the 8-year-old she’s babysitting for.

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