A
NEW STUDY
bolsters the long-standing claim of NAMBLA activists that consensual
sex between men and boys doesn't cause psychological damage.
The
"meta-analysis," which combines the results of 59 different studies,
was published in the preeminent Journal of the American Psychological
Association this summer.
Combining the results of so many surveys of college students confirms,
in a newly definitive way, the results of previous studies of
"non-clinical" populations: Sex does not pose the danger to minors
claimed by police, prosecutors and prudes crusading against man/boy
love. Instead, the majority of boys who have sexual
relationships
with adults view them as either positive or neutral experiences, and
boys with such experiences are not at any greater risk for "adjustment
difficulties.” For both boys and girls, a poor family
environment
is the main predictor of later problems.
The meta-analysis relied on the concept of emotional and psychological
"adjustment" and considered whether "sexual abuse" in childhood was a
significant threat to this measure of mental health. For the
purposes of the study, "sexual abuse" included any sexual interaction
between minors and older partners. It also included a minor's
sexual interaction with a similarly-aged peer if the episode was
unwanted.
Even using these biased definitions, the study revealed there was no
correlation between "sexual abuse" and "adjustment" for males and only
a very small correlation for females. (The study leaves open
the
possibility that an evaluation of girls' consensual
experiences
during childhood would reveal they were unrelated to later
psychological problems. There are currently no large scale
studies, for boys or girls, that directly address the differences
between consensual and non-consensual sexual experiences.)
The review also found 37% of males who had sex with an older youth or
an adult viewed it as a positive experience; 29% viewed it as neutral,
and 33% viewed it as negative. Moreover, their views of the
experiences became more positive over time -- calling into question the
definition of "abuse" commonly used by researchers. On the
other
hand, girls' experiences seem to be very different. Only 11%
of
females viewed their experience positively; 18% viewed it as neutral
and 72% viewed it as negative. Force or threats were reported
as
part of the experience by 43% of females, but only 23% of males so
reported.
The study is the most recent one of three major literature reviews on
childhood and adolescent sexual experiences published in the last two
years by a research team headed by Bruce Rind, a psychologist at Temple
University. The first of these reviews, published in early
1997,
is an overview of findings from clinical and non-clinical studies of
male child and adolescent sexual experiences with adults. The
second, published later in 1997, is a statistical meta-analysis of
findings from studies of "child sexual abuse" using national
probability samples. All three studies bring together
previously
disparate information on the sexual experiences of boys. The
two
statistical meta-analyses also present separate findings for girls.
The most recent article stands out because it is based on samples of
college students. The results from college samples are
considered
more relevant to common experiences than the results obtained from
studies of prison, hospital, or clinical populations.
The relevance of the findings is also supported by the high degree of
agreement between the results of the meta-analysis based on college
samples and the meta-analysis based on national probability samples
(samples designed to accurately reflect a cross-section of the national
population). Using a broad definition of "child sexual abuse"
that included both willing and unwanted sexual experiences between
minors and older partners, as well as unwanted sexual experiences
between age-peers (as defined above), and additional samples that
included only unwanted sexual experiences of minors, the two
meta-analyses yielded identical degrees of correlation between "sexual
abuse" and later adjustment, for both boys and girls. For
girls,
the correlation was of small magnitude (r = .10, where .30 is
considered medium strength and where 1.0 is the theoretical
maximum). For boys, the correlation was of an even smaller
magnitude (r = .07).
The small magnitudes of these correlations are noteworthy for two
reasons. First, because these correlations were obtained
using a
skewed data set that disproportionately represents unwanted sexual
experiences. In the case of males, when samples assessing
only
unwanted experiences are excluded, leaving only mixed samples of both
willing and unwanted experiences, the correlation with later adjustment
diminishes to a non-significant level. It is logical to
expect
the correlation would diminish still further if only willing
experiences were assessed. For girls, excluding the samples
of
only unwanted experiences, leaving mixed samples of both willing and
unwanted experiences, did not significantly alter the result.
But
because the remaining data set for girls is still substantially skewed
under this condition (due to the high rate of coercion in girls' sexual
experiences), it is still logical to assume that the magnitude of
correlation with later adjustment would diminish, possibly to
non-significance, if unwanted experiences were not included in the
assessment.
The small correlations are also noteworthy because, as the study's
authors point out, it is often claimed or assumed that "child sexual
abuse" (including consensual experiences) is harmful to most or all who
experience it. These findings show that this is not the case,
even for a sample biased heavily toward unwanted experiences.
At
the levels of correlation reported, the sexual interactions account for
less than 1% of the samples' variation in later adjustment.
Both
meta-analysis articles noted that the quality of family environment,
including physical and emotional abuse and neglect when present, was
much more important than sexual experience as a predictor of adult
adjustment. Some of the studies reviewed found that the
correlation between sex and adjustment vanished when family environment
was controlled for. This suggests that the real problem is
abusive treatment, not sex per se -- even when the
two occur
together.
Another important finding
of both the
1998 college sample meta-analysis and the 1997 national sample
meta-analysis is that there is a significant relationship between the
consent of the younger partner in the sexual interaction and measures
of later adjustment. This finding was reinforced by the 1997
literature review on boys' sexual experiences. According to
authors Robert Bauserman and Bruce Rind, even though the younger
partners' sexual knowledge may be incomplete at the time of the
experience, "self-defined consent, like absence of force, is in all
studies associated with positive outcomes or evaluations."
Aside from coercion and force, and gender differences, the only other
factor in sexual interactions that has been consistently found to be
linked with later adjustment is whether the participants were related
or not. Both the college sample meta-analysis and the
literature
review on boys' experiences found that incestuous experiences were more
likely to be perceived negatively and to be followed by adjustment
difficulty than non-incestuous experiences. Studies reviewed
in
the national sample meta-analysis did not separately assess the impact
of incest.
The full text of the studies reported here can be found in the
following journals:
Bauserman, R. & Rind, B. (1997).
Psychological
correlates of male child and adolescent sexual experience with adults:
A review of the nonclinical literature. Archives of
Sexual
Behavior, 26, 105-141.
Rind, B. & Tromovitch, P. (1997).
A meta-analytic
review of findings from national samples on psychological correlates of
child sexual abuse. The Journal of Sex Research, 34,
237-255.
Rind, B., Tromovitch, P, & Bauserman, R.
(1998). A
meta-analytic examination of assumed properties of child sexual abuse
using college samples. Psychological Bulletin, 124,
22-53.
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