Childhood maltreatment and the cycle of adult offending

¶ … journal Violence and Victims reviews findings from previous literature, which reflects the fact that abused children have a much-increased risk for several inappropriate social behaviors. There is no automatic or "inevitable" carrying out of violent acts just because a child was maltreated, although abused children are "likely to grow up and become frequent offenders" (Reckdenwald, et al., 2013, 466). The authors of this piece reference research projects that point to a number of behaviors that result from severe abuse during childhood: a) delinquency; b) general adult criminality; c) intimate partner violence; d) sex offending; e) child abuse; and f) abuse of drugs and alcohol (Reckdenwald, 467).

The authors in this article seek to verify that specific abuses that children are subjected to lead consistently to specific offenses later in life.

The author's main point

The author's main point involves narrative about the negative impacts of child abuse -- and the various harmful impacts later in life that are associated with each specific act of abuse. The point the authors make is referred to as "the cycle of violence," because it begins when the child is very young and then, in later life, the terrible things that happened to the child that is now an adult is perpetrated on another child. Hence, the cycle of violence is complete. In other words, offending later in life is often traced back to how the person was treated curing childhood; in order to further back up existing research, the authors retrieved data from sexual offenders locked up in a Canadian penitentiary. Among the main points that the authors set out to make is whether children who were physical abused (beaten, hit, or neglected) also tend to perpetrate that kind of aggression on others later in life. And also they set out to make the point that children that were sexually abused in childhood tend to be more involved in sex crimes (rather than violent acts per se) later in life. This is an important set of points to make because some scholars "…have also suggested that research has overestimated the connection between maltreatment and offending (Reckdenwald, 469).

Were there any specific issues addressed in the article? What were they?

Of course the specific issues related to the linkage between childhood maltreatment (in various forms) and later offending by the persons who had been abused or otherwise mistreated as children. In other words, Reckdenwald and colleagues were investigating if indeed research could prove out that abuse is "…carried from one generation to the next"; and if that could be proved, then their additional research would inquire as to what specific abuse tends to lead to what specific offending later?

There are detours along the way in terms of trying to prove that if a child is sexually abused then it stands to reason that he will do the same to others later in live. On page 469 the authors point to research by Fergusson et al. (2006) that showed that "childhood exposure to partner violence did not increase the risk of being a perpetrator or a victim of partner violence." In fact, there are scholars whose research indicates that "…most maltreated children do not turn to criminal offending later in life" although there are "long-term consequences" for children that were abused (Reckdenwald, 469). Those consequences may include "…revictimization, self-destructive [personal] behaviors, and substance abuse"; clearly a child that was abused and later abuses alcohol or drugs (or other destructive behaviors like becoming obese through poor diet) is not necessarily hurting others, so the cycle of violence doesn't hold up on those cases.

Moreover, another strong point made by Reckdenwald is that childhood abuse can lead during adolescence to: a) poor performance in school; b) mental health issues; c) peer groups made up of "deviant" members; d) a lack of skills to solve problems that come up in life; and e) "running away from home" (469).

As to the research that was conducted on incarcerated sex offenders in Canada, the authors report that "as predicted," the specific type of abuse that a child receives "…does in fact have a differential impact on offending" (based on research in Canada) (Reckdenwald, 476). In fact the authors report three "findings" that justifies their earlier assertions that abuse during childhood can be linked to later offending.

The three findings are: a) prior psychological abuse is "positively associated with the frequency of total offending"; b) physical abuse perpetrated against a child is "positively associated with the frequency of violent offending; and c) when there has been sexual abuse of a child that is "positively related with the frequency of sexual offending" later in life (Reckdenwald, 476).

How could the author expand on the main points?

On page 477 the authors admit there were "some limitations" on the study of the sex criminals in Canada. One of the limitations is that the "mail maltreatment predictors" were based on "self-reports" from the offenders, and how reliable can that information be expected to be? Also, in future research on childhood abuse issues there should be a "…more systematic examination of what causes individuals to carry trauma through their life," and why do they then inflict harm on others when they found it so hurtful and demeaning when it happened to them?