Evaluation of a Sexual Abuse Prevention Program for Adults With Mental Retardation

Abstract

Programs to teach sexual abuse prevention skills to persons with mental retardation have rarely been evaluated empirically, and typical evaluations are limited to assessment of the participants' knowledge rather than their performance of specific skills. In the present study, 6 adult women with mental retardation were trained in sexual abuse prevention, and performance was assessed using four separate measures: pretests and posttests of knowledge, verbal report, role play, and naturalistic probes. All women learned the skills but failed to exhibit them to criterion during the probes. We discuss the implications for further training and assessment of sexual abuse prevention skills.

Teaching Safety Skills to Children: Prevention of Firearm Injury as an Exemplar of Best Practice in Assessment, Training, and Generalization of Safety Skills

“…The three skills are to discriminate the presence of the safety threat and avoid contact with it, engage in behavior that functions to escape from the threat situation, and inform a parent or teacher about the threat so the threat can be removed (e.g., Johnson et al, 2005Johnson et al, , 2006Lumley, Miltenberger, Long, Rapp, & Roberts, 1998).…”

“…However, the same skills are applicable to numerous other safety threats such as those posed by finding an unattended bottle of medicine or poison, an open gate to a swimming pool, or a lighter or matches; and by requests to leave with an adult, engage in sexual activity or other inappropriate touch with an adult, to consume alcohol or drugs with an older child, or to engage in any dangerous behavior (e.g., Egemo-Helm et al, 2007;Johnson et al, 2005Johnson et al, , 2006Lumley et al, 1998). Whether the safety threat comes from contact with a danger in the physical environment or from an action of another person, the child's safety is best assured by his or her ability to (a) discriminate the presence of the threat and avoid contact with it, (b) get away from the threat, and (c) report the threat to a responsible adult.…”

“…BST has been shown to be effective in teaching a variety of safety skills including pedestrian safety skills (e. g., Yeaton & Bailey, 1978), fire safety skills (e. g., Jones, Kazdin, & Haney, 1981;Jones, Ollendick, McLaughlin, & Williams, 1989), sexual abuse prevention skills (e. g., Lumley et al, 1998;Miltenberger et al, 1999;Miltenberger, Thiesse-Duffy, Suda, Kozak, & Bruellman, 1990;Stillwell, Lutzker, & Green, 1988), abduction prevention skills (e. g., Johnson et al, 2005Johnson et al, , 2006Marchand-Martella, Huber, Martella, & Wood, 1996;Miltenberger & Olson, 1996;Poche, Brower, & Swearingen, 1981), and firearm injury prevention skills (e. g., Miltenberger et al, , 2005. Recent research evaluating BST for teaching skills to prevent gun play illustrates the application of BST and procedures for enhancing generalization following the use of BST.…”

Prevalence of maltreatment of people with intellectual disabilities: A review of recently published research

“…Other studies [Doren et al, 1996;McCartney and Campbell, 1998] have examined individual and environmental predictors of maltreatment, thereby elucidating points at which interventions are most critical. Still others [Lumley et al, 1998;Miltenberger et al, 1999;Khemka and Hickson, 2000;Khemka et al, 2005] have focused on evaluating prevention efforts. In addition to research studies, a number of publications [Goldson, 1998;Waldman et al, 1999;Anonymous, 2001;Ryan et al, 2001] have continued efforts to raise awareness of the problem.…”

Sexuality of Children and Adolescents With Developmental Disabilities

“…27 Children and adolescents with disabilities may be more vulnerable to sexual abuse because of dependence on others for intimate care, increased exposure to a large number of caregivers and settings, inappropriate social skills, poor judgment, inability to seek help or report abuse, and lack of strategies to defend themselves against abuse. 28 These fears may lead parents to protect their children from unsupervised social contacts and even from knowledge about sex. Some fear that talking about sexuality will promote sexual behavior.…”