Attachment Styles and Psychological Profiles of Child Sex Offenders in Ireland

Abstract

Acknowledgements: This project was partially funded by grants from the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform and the Eastern Regional Health Authority. Thanks to all colleagues in the prison services, the community employment scheme, the wholesale company and the TCD research panel for their co-operation and assistance. Results. A secure adult attachment style was four times less common in the child sex offender group than in any of the other three groups. 93% of sex offenders had an insecure adult attachment style and the majority (59%) had a fearful-insecure attachment style. Compared with community controls, the child sex offender group reported significantly lower levels of maternal and paternal care and significantly higher levels of maternal and paternal overprotection during their childhood. Compared with all three comparison groups, the child sexual offenders reported significantly more emotional loneliness and a more external locus of control.With respect to anger management, the child sexual offenders' profile more closely approximated those of non-violent offenders and community controls than that of violent offenders. Conclusions.Insecure attachment was a vulnerability factor uniquely associated with child sex offending in this study. Compared with violent and non-violent offenders and community controls, the child sexual offenders evaluated in this study were also characterized by poorer psychosocial adjustment and an anger management profile closer to the normal range than that of violent offenders.Attachment Styles 4

Sexual offenders’ parental and adult attachments and preferences for therapists’ interpersonal qualities

“…Three-quarters of the sample reported insecure attachments to one or both of their parents and three-quarters insecure adult attachments. The rates of insecure attachment are higher than would be expected in the normal population and although the rates vary between the small samples in previous studies (Marsa et al, 2004;McCarthy, 4 Corrected for ties 2004; Smallbone & Dadds, 1998), support the contention that insecure attachment is a vulnerability factor for sexual abuse. Given that one-quarter of the offenders reported secure attachments in childhood or adulthood, attachment difficulties alone cannot explain sexual offending, and since many who experience insecure attachments, do not sexually offend, attachment vulnerabilities must interact with a range of other variables as suggested in contemporary models of sexual offending (Smallbone, Marshall, & Wortley, 2008;Smallbone & Cale, 2015;Ward & Beech 2006).…”

“…Greater proportions of sex offenders report insecure adult attachment styles compared to non-offenders (Baker & Beech, 2004;Jamieson & Marshall, 2000;Marsa et al, 2004;Sawle & Kear-Colwell, 2001;Smallbone & Dadds, 1998) or normative non-offender data (Stirpe, Abracen, Stermac, & Wilson, 2006;Ward, Hudson, & Marshall, 1996). This was only observed for non-familial sex offenders who had abused children in Jamieson and Marshall's (2000) study, with no differences demonstrated between incest offenders and community controls, suggesting a complex relationship might exist in relation to adult attachment and different groups of sex offenders.…”

“…However, Smallbone and Dadds (1998) observed no differences between rapists and intra-familial or extra-familial child sexual abusers. With the exception of two studies (Lyn & Burton, 2005;Marsa et al, 2004), differences between sex offenders (e.g., adult-victim and child-victim offenders) and other groups of offenders have not been consistently observed in the majority of studies (Baker & Beech, 2000;Jamieson & Marshall, 2000;Smallbone & Dadds, 1998;Stirpe et al, 2006;Ward et al, 1996). Thus, insecure adult attachment might be a general criminal vulnerability factor that increases the propensity to engage in antisocial (and for some sexually abusive) behaviours.…”

“…This is despite equivocal evidential support. The majority of studies in which childhood attachment has been investigated reveal that insecure attachments to parents are more prevalent among sex offenders than in other offender or non-offender populations (Marsa et al, 2004;McCarthy, 2004;Smallbone & Dadds, 1998). Marshall, Serran and Cortoni (2000), however, did not find differences in attachment insecurity between sexual and nonsexual offenders.…”

Contributions to the Study of Violence and Trauma

“…At a clinical level measures of attachment styles may routinely be incorporated into assessment protocols in evaluation studies of programmes for marital Violence and trauma 12 violence, child abuse and neglect and the treatment of violent offenders (e.g. Marsa, O'Reilly, Carr, Murphy, O'Sullivan, Cotter, & Heavy, 2004). This is particularly important because effective intervention programmes must help perpetrators of violence to develop internal working models of self and others and relationship skills associated with more secure attachment styles.…”