What is Child Sexual Abuse?

While this seems like a straightforward question, criminally defining sexual abuse and assault differs federally and from state to state.

Federal legislation, providing the minimum standards that States must incorporate into their statues, is covered in the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA).

The CAPTA definition of “child abuse and neglect” refers to:

“Any recent act or failure to act on the part of a parent or caretaker, which results in death, serious physical or emotional harm, sexual abuse, or exploitation, or an act or failure to act which presents an imminent risk of serious harm.” ⁽¹⁾

The CAPTA Definition if “sexual abuse” includes:

“The employment, use, persuasion, inducement, enticement, or coercion of any child to engage in, or assist any other person to engage in, any sexually explicit conduct or simulation of such conduct for the purpose of producing a visual depiction of such conduct; or

The rape, and in cases of caretaker or interfamilial relationships, statutory rape, molestation, prostitution, or other form of sexual exploitation of children, or incest with children.” ⁽²⁾

If we cannot clearly define child sexual abuse, we cannot clearly estimate the number of children that are victims. Generally abuse is believed to involve a young child who is victimized by an adult. However, abuse cannot only be defined in this vacuum - there are many other forms of sexual abuse, such as a 12 year-old being sexually assaulted by a 15 year-old. Additionally, cases reported to official agencies are generally investigated and meet a particular standard which can be added to data, but what about the cases that are never reported? Leading many to believe that official estimates often underestimate the actual number of victims.⁽⁶⁾

A complete listing of state statutes can be found at:

http://www.childwelfare.gov/systemwide/laws_policies/statutes/defineall.pdf

A complete listing of state by state mandated reporters can be found at:

http://www.childwelfare.gov/systemwide/laws_policies/statutes/mandaall.pdf