Chapter 15 How the Madness Began
I have often asked myself, “How did the madness begin?” There's no doubt that this is crazy, so madness is a term that fits very well. As I write more on the subject in this chapter the madness will be revealed in all of its nuances, so there will be little room for doubt. You could say that the current situation regarding sex offenses is one of the most rapidly increasing forms of crime in this country. Is it the backlash of pent-up anger and hatred toward men as a result of the repression of women for centuries? You wouldn't be wrong, but you wouldn't be entirely right either. You could say that the current situation is the result of anger and frustration from the inequality between the sexes in our society. You wouldn't be wrong, but you wouldn't be entirely right either. You could say it's the result of the meltdown of the nuclear family and the rise of the latchkey child, that is the real reason these things are happening. This too is correct, but it isn't entirely right either. The point that I'm trying to make here is that these statements while being correct cannot explain every aspect of a very complicated issue. Back in 1980 there was a significant increase in the number of reported cases of child maltreatment. Maltreatment can be anything from physical abuse to sexual abuse.
It was during the '80s that the McMartin preschool trial hit the scene, where the owners of a preschool were falsely accused of molesting the children in their care. This case shattered the myth that children are incapable of lying. As a result of this trial and the revelation that the methods employed by psychologists and social workers in gathering testimonial evidence to be used at trial had failed in detecting the truth, a re-evaluation of child investigative interviews was conducted. In 1998 psychologists Deborah A. Poole and Michael E. Lamb wrote a book entitled Investigative Interviews of Children and it is from this book that I will present some of their views that should help to explain this phenomenon.
Although recognition of child abuse has increased dramatically since 1960, there is little evidence that children are at greater risk today than they were during earlier historical periods. Economic and physical hardship have always been associated with declines in the quality of care offered to children. According to Kessen (1965), however attitudes toward children have changed dramatically since the 17th-century for three major reasons: improved medical care, the Industrial Revolution, and Darwin's theory of evolution.
Before the 17th-century, there were few standards for rearing children and little public interest in the early years of life. During the 17th-century, however, records became sufficiently detailed to arouse widespread concern about child welfare. As Kessen (1965) explained in his book, "The Child", physicians avoided the child so long because they seemed hopelessly resistant to medical intervention. It was only yesterday in human history that the majority of children could be expected to live beyond their fifth year. Before 1750, for example the odds were 3 to 1 against a child in London reaching five years of age. In addition to death by disease, children faced a huge risk of abandonment and little hope of surviving the "foundling" homes that were set up to handle the "dropping" of babies. According to Kessen only 45 out of 10,272 infants survived in a Dublin foundling home during the late 18th century. Not knowing how to improve the survival rate of young children, society expressed little interest in this period of life. Though harsh, conditions during this time represented the continuation of a long history of child maltreatment that included practices such as infanticide and ritual mutilation (Zigler and Hall, 1991)
The National Center on Child Abuse and Neglect (NCCAN) compiles data on child abuse and neglect referrals and their disposition following investigation. In the 1993 summary, reproduced in figure 1.1, shows a steady increase in referrals between 1976 and 1992, with the 1992 and 1993 figures at 43 reports per 1000 U.S. children under the age of 18 (US Department of Health and Human Services, 1995). Stated differently, 2.9 million reports of maltreatment in 1993 prompted approximately 1.6 million investigations, most of which were conducted without adequate resources to respond effectively. For example, although the number of reports grew tremendously between 1985 and 1991, 35 states held funding steady or reduced support for child protective services during this period (Pence and Wilson, 1994).
Efforts to advocate on behalf of children were complicated not only by the increased number of referrals but also by the changing nature of these reports. Four trends during the 1980s and early 1990s influenced the focus and content of interviewing protocols: a disproportionate increase in allegations of sexual abuse, increased publicity about reports of severe or bizarre abuse, referrals from a wide range of professional and nonprofessional sources, and an increased number of very young alleged victims.
In 1993, 49 percent of all reports or for neglect, 24 percent for physical abuse, 14 percent for sexual abuse, and 22 percent for other types of maltreatment, including emotional maltreatment, medical neglect, abandonment, and congenital drug addiction. (Figures do not add to 100 percent because the same child can experience more than one type of abuse; US Department of Health and Human Services, NCCAN, 1995).
To what extent it did the increased number of reports reflect an increased risk to children as opposed to increased awareness of abuse? Because social expectations play a large role in the identification of maltreatment, there probably is no definitive answer to this question. On the one hand, the past two decades were characterized by increases in the number of single parent households, a risk factor for sexual abuse. On the other hand, changing awareness of abuse and mandated reporting also may have fueled the increase in reporting rates. For example, Ceci and Bruck (1995) argued that younger and older adults seemed equally likely to have been sexually abused as children, suggesting that there have been no dramatic changes in prevalence. In addition, although many more cases are reported, the number of cases that are classified as "substantiated" has remained steady or dropped slightly (Besharov, 1990; Ceci and Bruck, 1995). Nonetheless, the number of arrests for sexual offenses has increased markedly, from approximately 159,200 in 1976 to more than 247,000 in 1991 (US Department of Justice, 1978, 1992).
Assuming that Kessen (1965), Besharov, (1990), Ceci and Bruck, 1995 are correct and the number of actual reports of child maltreatment has remained the same or slightly decreased since 1965, then all of the reported incidents of child maltreatment above the red line represent the number of reports that created wrongful accusations per year. A substantial increase which is corroborated by the U.S. Dept. of Justice report above. What this means is that 5,853 innocent men are convicted for child maltreatment every year.
The increased awareness of sexual abuse has paralleled increased publicity about the most violent and unusual forms of child maltreatment. Many professional publications in the 1980s and early 1990s focused on the tragedy of child fatalities, noting that one-half of all fatalities occurred in families that were already known to social service agencies or other helping professionals (Korbin, 1994). Thousands of stranger abductions were reported annually (Finkelhor, Hotaling, and Sedlak, 1990), prompting public service announcements that encourage parents and children to use "code words" to prevent kidnapping. See Best, 1989, for a critical look at the politics of social problem statistics.) Children in the inner cities were exposed to violence with alarming frequency. For example, interviews with parents determined that 51 percent of fifth graders in New Orleans and 32 percent of 6 to 10-year-olds in Washington, D.C., had been victims of violence (see Osofsky, 1995, for a review). These portraits of an increasingly violent world altered adults perceptions of what was possible or even likely. Media publicity contributed to this perception through coverage of highly publicized trials involving references to ritualistic features such as baby killing, animal sacrifice, religious candles, and other objects of ritual worship (see Ceci and Bruck, 1995, for case studies). In addition, professional workshops on ritualistic/satanic abuse increased dramatically (Nathan and Snedeker, 1995).
According to NCCAN's annual compilation, educators are by far the most frequent source of referrals to child protective services, accounting for 16% of all reports. There followed, in order of prominence, by legal/justice (12%), social service (12%) and medical (11%) professionals, with friends and neighbors (10%), other relatives (10%), parents (7%), child care providers (2%) and even victims and perpetrators (2%) providing the remaining reports (11% are anonymous or unknown, and 7% are listed as "other").
Unfortunately many adults converse with alleged victims before investigative interviews take place, and each conversation provides an opportunity for adults to influence a child's report. On one hand, adults may encourage children to deny abuse, either by making explicit threats or by expressing disapproval or doubt. On the other hand, adults suspicions of abuse can affect how suggestively they questioned children and, alternately, the quality of information on which decisions must be based. As McGough explained (1996), legal and social service professionals often faced the "honky-tonk the effect"-an inability to piece together what really had happened to children whose accounts had been contaminated and this problem was exacerbated when referrals came from various sources.
In as awareness of sexual abuse increased, the problems associated with prosecuting these crimes prompted procedural changes to accommodate children's involvement in the legal system. The process began in 1982, when the American Bar Association's national legal resource center for child advocacy and protection published a list of proposed legal reforms that included altering courtroom environments to minimize children's distress, interagency cooperation to reduce the number of interviews, and changes in the rules of evidence governing the presentation of information at trial (see McGough, 1994, for a review). Changes in the rules of evidence were most controversial because they involved minimizing competency in valuations for child witnesses and permitting the use of children's hearsay statements. As McGough indicated, "the creation of special rules of evidence that apply only to child victims of sexual abuse represented an astonishing detour from the traditional path of the law." (P. 16).
There are number of reasons why researchers have focused on interviews with young children. First, legal reforms have removed barriers that previously impeded the prosecution of cases involving very young children. Indeed, Gray (1993) reported that in one sample sexual abuse cases involving preschool children were disproportionately likely to progress to trial. Second, researchers have been fascinated by evidence that preschoolers can be amazingly accurate undersigned conditions but that they are more likely than older children or adults to succumb to suggestions (Ceci and Bruck, 1993). Finally, the fear that adults might misunderstand young children's comments or overreact to their sexualized behavior has fueled concerned that referrals involving young children are more likely to be invalid. The interviewing protocols that evolved during this period reflected the need to accommodate younger children, suggesting the use of developmentally appropriate language to ensure that young children understand interviewers questions and avoidance of representational aids such as dolls because some young children do not use props accurately to report events. Unfortunately research and guidelines for meeting the special needs of other groups, such as adolescents, have lagged behind.
It is difficult to estimate how many false allegations are made, because rarely is their certainty about what really happened. In the case of sexual abuse, and external evidence in the form of a confession, consistent medical findings, or other evidence (e.g., pornographic pictures of the child) is very seldom available (e.g., Eliot and Briere, 1994; Lamb et al., 1997). Despite the methodological barriers to estimating false allegations rights, it frequently has been claimed that only approximately 5-8% of sexual abuse allegations are false. This estimate has appeared in numerous articles (e.g., Sink, 1988), was underscored by the American Professional Society on the Abuse of Children (APSAC, 1993), and has been cited by experts in court (Ceci and Bruck, 1995). Several authors, however (e.g., Ceci and Bruck, 1995; Robin, 1991; Wakefield and Underwager, 1991), have argued that this rate is misleadingly low because it includes only delivered attempts to deceive rather than cases in which honest errors were made (e.g., premature judgments about a gentle rash or misinterpretations of children's comments). When the latter are included, estimates jump from 6% to 23% for one comprehensive study (Jones and McGraw, 1987), with rates of approximately 35% or higher when allegations arising in the context of divorce or custody proceedings are included (e.g. Benedik and Schertky, cited in Jones and Seig, 1998; Faller, 1991;Thonnes and Tjaden, 1990).
Everson and Boat in 1989 as to child protective service workers in North Carolina to identify cases in which a child or adolescent made an allegation that the worker believed was false. Common reasonings for identifying an allegation as false were improbable, inconsistent or recanted reports. In 59 percent of these cases, respondents concluded that the child or adolescent had deliberately fabricated in order to obtain secondary gains, such as changes in living arrangements, or to retaliate against a parent.
Over the years, research on the causes of child maltreatment has focused less on parental psychopathology and more on the broader social factors, such as societal attitudes and structures (Cicchetti and Carlson, 1991). This focus on social contexts also is useful for analyzing why concerns developed about investigative interviewing. Six factors are especially relevant: (a) the economic climate of the '80s, (b) a revival of conservative politics in the media, (c) a therapeutic focus on childhood victimization, (d) the increased exposure of children to sexual material at a time when police about the indicators of abuse were changing, (e) changing conceptions of sexual abuse, and (f) in attention to the differences between therapy and investigation when helping professionals were trained.
Many authors have noted how moral panics and resulting controversies often developed during periods of rapid social change. For example, Robin (1991) wrote an insightful essay on how American individualism favors solutions to social problems that focus on individual deviance rather than changes in the basic organization of society. Furthermore, he noted how changes in sexuality, sexual identity, and family roles threaten to the traditional family and allowed child abuse to become "a convenient focus for public anxiety about changing social conditions related to the family" (p. 9). Similarly, Tavri (1992) argued that some women who became entangled in the "survivor" movement in the absence of prior concerns about their childhood identified with the sexual-victim culture because it provided "a lightning rod for the inchoate feelings of victimization they have as a result of their status in society at large. It provides a clear focus than such vague enemies as "the system", sexism, deadening work, welfare, or boredom" (p. 321). These and other system-level critiques do not deny the reality of abuse or minimize its consequences. Rather, they attempt to understand the moral panic in recent decades that has fostered increased concerns about false allegations.
During the past decades, the challenges when confronted fueled a market for pop psychology, self-help books written by professionals, and therapy by licensed professionals. In many of these forms, women's depression and anxiety were explained as consequences of individual personalities, decisions, or life experiences rather than as predictable responses to social and economic circumstances.
The tendency to attribute women's problems to their individual experiences is reflected in the intense controversy over repressed memories of childhood sexual abuse. Some of the women who flooded into therapy during the past decade for depression, anxiety, and relationship problems were told that their difficulties resemble those of women who had been sexually abused. Clinicians sometimes used special techniques to help their clients recall abusive experiences-including hypnosis, dream interpretation, and guided imagery-under the assumption that the presumed abuse must be remembered before therapy could be successful. In one study, 25% of the doctor-level therapists surveyed reported that (a) they sometimes concluded after only one session the clients who did not report abuse had in fact been abused as children, (b) abused clients needed to acknowledge our remembered their abuse for therapy to be effective, and (c) they used to or more therapeutic techniques specifically to help clients remembered childhood sexual abuse (Poole, Lindsay, Memon, Bull, 1995) by their own estimates, these American and British therapists often were successful in retrieving memories of abuse. Extrapolation into the population of therapists from which the sample had been drawn suggested that during the two-year period examined by the survey, hundreds of thousands of women were exposed to therapists who held such beliefs (see also Polusny and Follette, 1996).
On a specific calculation of our data, it may be stated that at least 85% of the younger male population could be convicted as sex offenders if law enforcement officials were as efficient as most people expect them to be. The stray boy who is caught and brought before the court may not be different from most of his fellows, but the public, not knowing of the near universality of adolescent sexual activity, heaps the penalty for the whole group upon the shoulders of the one boy who happens to be apprehended. This situation presents a considerable dilemma for law enforcement officials and for students of the social organization as a whole. (Kinsey, 1948 p. 224)
References
Besharov, D. J, (1990), Recognizing child abuse. New York: Free Press.
Ceci, S. J, & Bruck, M. (1993), Suggestibility of the child witness: A historical review and synthesis. Psychological Bulletin, 113, 403-439.
Ceci, S. J, & Bruck, M. (1995), Jeopardy in the courtroom: A scientific analysis of children's testimony. Washington D.C.: American psychological association.
Faller, K. (1991), Possible explanations for child sexual abuse allegations in divorce. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 61,86-91.
Finkelhor, D., Hotaling, G. T., & Sedlak, A. (1990). Missing, objected, runaway, and throwaway children in America; First report. Washington D.C.: Juvenile Justice Clearinghouse.
Gray, E. (1993). Unequal justice: The prosecution of child sexual abuse. New York: Mac Millan.
Jones, D., & McGraw, J. M. (1987). Reliable and fictitious accounts of sexual abuse in children. Journal of Interpersonal Violence,2, 27-45.
Jones, D. P. H., & Seig, A. (1988). Child sexual abuse allegations in custody or visitation cases: A report of 20 cases. In E. B. Nicholson (Ed.), Sexual abuse allegations in custody and visitation cases: a resource book for judges and court personnel. Washington, D.C.: American Bar Association National Legal Resource Center for Child Advocacy and Protection.
Kessen, W. (1965). The child. New York: Wiley.
Kinsey, A. C., Pomeroy, W. B. , & Martin, C. E. (1948). Sexual behavior in the human male. Philadelphia: Saunders.
Korbin, J. E. (1994). Perpetrators of fatal child maltreatment. The APSAC Advisor, 7(4), 45-46.
Lamb, M. E., Sternberg, K. J., Esplin, P. W., Hershkowitz, I., & Orbach, Y. (1997). Assessing the credibility of children's allegations of sexual abuse: Insights from recent research. Learning and Individual Differences, 9, 175-194.
Lamb, M. E., Sternberg, K. J., Esplin, P. W., Hershkowitz, I., Orbach, Y., & Hovav, M. (1997). Criterion based content analysis: a field validation study. Child Abuse & Neglect, 21, 255-264.
McGough, L. S. (1996). Commentary: Achieving real reform -- the case for American interviewing protocols. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, 61 (4-5, Serial No. To 48), 188-203.
McGough, L. S., & Warren, A. R. (1994). The all-important investigative interview. Juvenile and Family Court Journal, 45, 13-29.
Nathan, D., & Snedeker, M. (1995). Satan's silence: Ritual abuse and the making of a modern American witch hunt. New York: Basic Books.
Osofsky, J. D. (1995. The effect of exposure to violence on young children. American Psychologist, 50, 782-788.
Pence, D., & Wilson, C. (1994). Team investigation of child sexual abuse. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Polusny, M. A. , & Follette, V M. (1996). Remembering childhood sexual abuse: A national survey of psychologists clinical practices, police, and personal experiences. Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, 27, 41-52.
Poole, D. A., Lindsay, D. S.,Memon, A., & Bull, R. (1995). Psychotherapy and the recovery of memories of childhood sexual abuse: U.S. and British practitioners opinions, practices, and experiences. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 63, 426-437.
Robin, M. (1991). The social construction of child abuse and "false allegations." In M. Robin (Ed.), Assessing child maltreatment reports: the problem of false allegations (pp. 1-34). Binghamton, New York: Haworth Press.
Sink, F. (1988). Studies of true and false allegations: a critical review in E. B. Nicholson (Ed.), Sexual abuse allegations in custody and visitation cases: A resource book for judges and court personnel (pp. 37-47). Washington, D.C.: American Bar Association.
Tavris, C. (1992). The measure of woman. New York: Touchstone.
Theonnes, M., & Tjaden, P. G. (1990). The extent, nature and validity of sexual abuse allegations in custody/visitation disputes. Child Abuse & Neglect, 14, 151-163.
Wakefield, H. & Underwager, R. (1991). Sexual abuse allegations in divorce in custody disputes. Behavioral Sciences and the Law, 9,451-468.
Zigler, E., & Hall, N. W. (1991). Physical child abuse in America: past, present, and future. In D. Cicchetti & V Carlson (Eds.), Child maltreatment (pp. 38-75). New York: Cambridge University Press.
Have You Been To Jail For Justice
Was it Cesar Chavez or Rosa Parks that day?
Some say Dr. King or Ghandi
Set them on their way
No matter who your mentors are
It's pretty plain to see
That if you've been to jail for justice
You're in good company
Have you been to jail for justice?
I want to shake your hand
'Cause sitting in and laying down
Are ways to take a stand
Have you sung a song for freedom
Or marched that picket line?
Have you been to jail for justice?
Then you're a friend of mine
You law abiding citizens
Come listen to this song
Laws are made by people
And people can be wrong
Once unions were against the law
But slavery was fine
Women were denied the vote
While children worked the mine
The more you study history
The less you can deny it
A rotten law stays on the books
'til folks with guts defy it!
Have you been to jail for justice?
I want to shake your hand
'Cause sitting in and laying down
Are ways to take a stand
Have you sung a song for freedom
Or marched that picket line?
Have you been to jail for justice?
Then you're a friend of mine
Well the law is supposed to serve us
And so are the police
When the system fails
It's up to us to speak our piece
We must be ever vigilant
For justice to prevail
So get courage from your convictions
Let 'em haul you off to jail!
Have you been to jail for justice?
I want to shake your hand
'Cause sitting in and laying down
Are ways to take a stand
Have you sung a song for freedom
Or marched that picket line?
Have you been to jail for justice?
Then you're a friend of mine
Have you been to jail for justice
Have you been to jail for justice
Have you been to jail for justice
Then you're a friend of mineBy Peter, Paul and Mary
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