A qualitative study of convicted female child sex offenders: Examining motivation and attribution of meaning

摘要

The goal of this dissertation is to uncover the subjective meanings that solo female child sex offenders and co-offending female child sex offenders attribute to their involvement in committing acts of child sexual abuse (CSA). Meaning, as used throughout this paper, refers to individuals' accounts of their feelings and thoughts while the criminal event was unfolding (Scott & Lyman, 1968). A situational approach to violent events examines the interaction of social setting, interpersonal interaction, and attribution of meaning given by offenders. Through focused interviews with convicted female child sex offenders, I explored the manner in which solo female child sex offenders and co-offending female child sex offenders organize the offending event, explain and account for the motivation for committing CSA, how they select victims, and the strategies they use to keep their act hidden from others before and after the crime is exposed. Like some other qualitative studies of interpersonal violence, this research relies on a phenomenological approach (Jacobs & Wright, 2006; Luckenbill, 1977; Maruna, 2001; Scully & Marolla, 1985, Taylor, 2007; Toch, 1969).;There are three major gaps in the existing literature on female child sex offenders. First, according to existing research, female perpetrated sexual abuse remains under detected and under reported for a variety of reasons. Second, although there are many studies of the way in which offenders, particularly males, organize their criminal activity (i.e.: robbery, assault, homicide, and rape); there remains very little research examining the situational dynamics of female-perpetrated CSA. And third, much of literature that focuses on female child sex offenders tends to include women who are co-offenders, specifically offending with a male counterpart, with solo female offenders. Therefore, there is a need for further exploration into the manner in which solo female child sex offenders and co-offending female child sex offenders organize sexual assaults against children with specific attention given to their motivations, target selection, strategies used to keep the act hidden, the characterizations of responses to them once their acts are exposed, and how they experience being known and labeled as a child sexual abuse offender. This research addresses the gap in the literature on CSA by focusing on female perpetrated child sexual abuse. Furthermore, it is anticipated that this research has implications for the treatment of female sex offenders generally and solo female child sex offenders specifically.