Female Sex Offenders: Gender, Denial, and Recognition

Introduction

Sexual offending has been construed in both the popular and professional domains as an exclusively male activity. While there is little doubt that males commit the vast majority of sexual offenses reported to police, and that their victims are predominantly female, the notion of male abusers and female victims has become paradigmatic within the field of child sexual abuse. This has tended to obscure the recognition of male victims and female perpetrators of sexual abuse (Denov, 2001).

In the last fifty years, there has been a strong shift in the attitudes and beliefs surrounding sexual abuse and sexual offenses. This is particularly true when it comes to female sexual offenders and the rates at which they abuse others. Even those who were willing to believe that females could also be sexual offenders often felt that sexual offenses in general were very rare, and that most children were not abused. One writer in the 1950s and another in the 1970s suggested that the rate of incest between fathers and daughters was approximately 1 in 1 million (Denov, 2003). Now that the issue has been studied more thoroughly, rates have been found to be much higher than first thought, and, most alarmingly, the rates of child sexual abuse appear to be rising (Denov, 2003).

This appears to be the case for female sexual offenders as well as male sexual offenders, though some of this increase may reflect the fact that female sexual offenders are only now beginning to be recognized in larger numbers. In other words, the abuse may have been equally prevalent in the past, but the rates at which it was reported and believed were far lower. Due to this underreporting, it was assumed that females did not commit sexual crimes. When most people—even today—think of sexual offenders, they assume the perpetrator is male and the victim is female. In reality, this is not always the case.

Prevalence of Female Sexual Offending

Petrovich and Templar (1984) found that 59% of 83 prisoners convicted of rape had been molested by a female in their childhood. The mean age of the boys at the time of the molestation was 11.5 years, and 82% of the cases involved intercourse. Fritz, Stoll, and Wagner (1981) administered a questionnaire to 412 female and 540 male college students and found that 7% of the women and 4.8% of the men reported having been molested as a child. Moreover, 10% of the women and 60% of the men reported having been molested by a female. In their research involving college men in the United States, Fromuth and Burkhart (1987) discovered that 15% of men in one sample and 13% in a second sample reported childhood sexual contact. Notably, the majority of perpetrators in those cases were female: 78% of respondents in one sample and 72% in the other reported having experienced sexual abuse by a female.

These numbers are significant, because they indicate that the rates of molestation and other sexual crimes perpetrated by females may actually be much higher than previously suspected. These types of crimes deserve closer study so that their causes can be better understood (Denov, 2003). By identifying the causes of sexual aggression in female perpetrators, steps can be taken to reduce the number of female sexual offenders and thereby protect more children from becoming victims. Whether the motivations behind sexual offenses committed by females are the same as those of males is a question that must also be considered. If females are assumed to share the same motivations, they will be treated and rehabilitated in the same manner. If, however, their motivations are actually quite different, then existing treatment and rehabilitative approaches may not work as intended or as effectively as they do with male offenders.

Judicial and Mental Health Decision Making

The way in which judicial professionals and mental health practitioners think about their work and make professional decisions is said to be influenced by formal occupational culture (Chan, 1996; Holdaway, 1999; Light, 1980). Some aspects of this culture clearly reveal that, while the prevalence of sexual offenses committed by female perpetrators appears to be on the rise, much of the judicial system and the mental health community continues to operate under the belief that women are essentially incapable of any form of sexual aggression (Anderson & Struckman-Johnson, 1998).

Individuals who are female, or perceived as "feminine," are considered to be nurturing, caring, protective, non-aggressive, and non-sexual (Denov, 2003). Because of these associations, the idea that a woman might harm someone—especially in a way related to sexuality—is almost inconceivable to some individuals, even when their knowledge and training tells them otherwise. The sexual scripts that most people operate by are not only heterosexual but gender-based as well. Asking people to suspend this type of "normal" thinking and accept that a woman is capable of committing a sexual offense is something that even educated professionals frequently struggle with (Denov, 2003). This may help explain why so many women suspected of—or even charged with—sexual offenses receive little or no punishment from the judicial system and often do not spend as much time in counseling for their behavior as their male counterparts.

Although this is changing somewhat, strong stereotypical responses persist, and society must overcome them in order to recognize these women as equally dangerous and destructive. Studies support this point: those who evaluate cases involving female perpetrators and male victims tend to regard such cases as less serious instances of "child abuse" compared with cases involving male perpetrators and female victims (Denov, 2003).

Conclusion

The culture of denial within organizational contexts may not only exonerate the female sex offender and diminish the seriousness of the harm inflicted on the victim—it also affects sentencing patterns and the official recognition of female sex offending more broadly. The low rates of female sex offending in official sources must therefore be understood within this context. As discussed throughout this paper, there are many reasons why female sex offenders are not punished as severely as their male counterparts. From underreporting to victim denial, to denial by law enforcement and society, to comparatively lenient sentencing, female sexual offenders have numerous pathways by which to avoid meaningful accountability. Those who are punished are very often not punished as severely as male offenders.

It appears that society continues to believe that only males can commit sexual offenses, even in the face of substantial evidence to the contrary. Many assume that women are incapable of rape—not only because of physical differences, but also because they are presumed to lack the aggressive and sometimes violent nature associated with male offending. While this may be true for the majority of women, there are also many non-aggressive males who would never consider sexually abusing anyone.

If society can accept that there are non-offending men, then it is equally logical to accept that there are sexually aggressive females. Some of these women have likely experienced abuse in their own pasts and know no other behavioral pattern. Others may have mental health difficulties that are not apparent until an offense has been committed. Whatever their reasons for offending, the victims of these crimes frequently lack a voice. They rarely speak up, and when they do, many are dismissed or ignored by those most positioned to help them. It is easy to understand, when this occurs, why many victims end up in denial about what happened or convince themselves to some degree that it was their fault.

More research is clearly needed into the issue of female sexual offending, both because so little has been done to date and because the numbers of females being reported for sexual offenses are rising. Society may be in denial now, but the problem cannot be ignored indefinitely.

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