Exploring the Ownership of Child-Like Sex Dolls

Abstract

There is a fervent social debate ongoing that relates to the ownership of child-like sex dolls. On the one hand, some proponents of dolls suggest that they offer a safe sexual outlet for minor-attracted people (MAPs) and could be used in efforts to prevent the sexual abuse of children. On the other side of the debate, child-like dolls are seen as articles that sexualize children, encourage deviant fantasies, and increase offending risk. To date, no empirical analyses have been undertaken with people who own such dolls. In this paper, we present data from child-like sex doll owners (n = 85) and MAPs who do not own dolls (n = 120) recruited from online forums visited by people who own sex dolls or forums for people with sexual attractions to children. Specifically, we compared their psychological characteristics and proclivities for sexual aggression. Among non-owners, 79.2% of participants declared an interest in owning a sex doll, which is higher than the 20–40% rate reported in adult-attracted samples of non-owners. We found few differences between the groups on most personality variables, with doll owners being less antisocial and anxiously attached than non-owners, but exhibiting more schizotypal traits. Related to offending proclivities, doll ownership was associated with lower levels of sexual preoccupation and self-reported arousal to hypothetical abuse scenarios, but higher levels of sexually objectifying behaviors and anticipated enjoyment of sexual encounters with children. We discuss these data in relation to a functional model of child-like sex doll ownership among MAPs.

Berichtete Konsequenzen des Verbots von Sexpuppen mit kindlichem Erscheinungsbild

“…Pädophilie, genutzt werden könnten und somit ein großes Potenzial für den Schutz von bspw. Kindern bergen könnten ( Brown und Shelling 2019 ; Harper und Lieveseley 2022 ; Levy 2007 ; Rutkin 2016 ). Hierbei wird der mögliche Nutzen für die betroffenen Individuen, aber auch für die Gesellschaft insgesamt höher bewertet als die moralischen Bedenken.…”

“…Anders als bei der Nutzung von Missbrauchsabbildungen führen diese nicht unmittelbar zu negativen Folgen für Kinder und Jugendliche. In Übereinstimmung damit fanden Harper und Lievesley (2022) in ihrer empirischen Untersuchung, in der sie Personen mit pädo-hebephilem sexuellen Interesse mit bzw. ohne Puppe verglichen, dass diejenigen, die eine Puppe verwendeten, geringere Ausprägungen von antisozialen Persönlichkeitsmerkmalen zeigten.…”

Banning Childlike Sex Dolls

“…In September 2022, Harper and Lievesly published an empirical study on use of CSDs. The study is motivated by the researchers' criticism towards the one-sided approach that dominates the CSD debate ('it is repulsive to use/ own CSDs'); this viewpoint fails to acknowledge the potential for dolls playing a role in prevention of child sexual abuse (Harper & Lievesley, 2022). The study found that some of the concerns about CSD users being at a greater risk of engaging in sexual abuse of actual children might be misplaced: Behavioural proclivity and arousal to hypothetically engaging in child sexual abuse is lower among CSD owners than among minor-attracted people (MAP) non-owners.…”

“…Additionally, CSDs 'offer MAPs the opportunity to mimic raising children in the kinds of ways that teleiophilic individuals do in surrogate parental relationships, where sexual motivations for ownership may be secondary. Dolls need not be positively or negatively related to sexual risk but may be seen as a functional part of the lives of individuals who, through their sexual attraction patterns, are unable to live such full lives with real partners or children' (Harper & Lievesley, 2022).…”

“…This was true until September 2022, where Harper and Lievesley published the first empirical study exploring psychological and risk-related constructs associated with ownership of CSDs. Harper and Lievesley found evidence for a functional use of the dolls(Harper & Lievesley, 2022).…”