Prevention is Better than Cure: The Value of Situational Prevention in Organisations

An Opportunity View of Child Sexual Offending: Investigating Nonpersuasion and Circumstances of Offending Through Criminological Lens

“…The critical point, as Wortley and Smallbone pointed out, is that opportunistic offending is driven by the offending circumstances even though the offender also plays a role. This suggests that a close examination of the situation is critical to determine what best characterizes opportunistic child sexual offending, which is exactly in line with the work of Kaufman (Kaufman, Mosher, Carter, & Estes, 2006; Kaufman, Tews, Schuett, & Kaufman, 2012) for instance completed to provide guidelines to practitioners and policy makers for situational prevention purposes and the emergent area of situational prevention in child sexual offending (e.g., Leclerc, Chiu, & Cale, 2016).…”

Recommendations for Preventing Child Sexual Abuse in Youth-Serving Organizations: Implications From an Australian Royal Commission Review of the Literature

“…Kaufman and his colleagues built on the SPM (which was initially conceived for criminal activity in general), to develop the SPA for use more specifically in the prevention of CSA (Kaufman et al, 2006; Kaufman & Patterson, 2010; Kaufman et al, 2012). The SPA is rooted in a number of well-regarded criminal justice theories (e.g., rational choice theory (Cornish & Clarke, 1986), routine activity theory (Cohen & Felson, 1979), and defensible space theory (Newman, 1972), as well as an extensive research literature on the effectiveness of the underlying SPA; see Kaufman et al, 2012, for a more in-depth discussion).…”

“…The intention was to create a prevention approach that could be carried out with minimal training, would benefit from staff expertise and experience, and would address a broad array of risks to children and adolescents within the organization. The goal of the SPA was to identify as many risk-related concerns as possible in an organizational setting at a given point in time (Kaufman, Hayes, & Knox, 2010; Kaufman & Patterson, 2010; Kaufman et al, 2012) and to engage staff in developing a practical and effective local solution addressing each of these concerns. In this way, the SPA can assist an organization in shifting its focus toward prevention (i.e., addressing safety risks when they are small and manageable and prior to when they might lead to a child being harmed).…”

“…Evidence suggests that the vast majority of children in the United States and other countries are regularly involved with youth-serving organizations (YSOs; Kaufman, Tews, Schuett, & Kaufman, 2012). YSOs are diverse, and range from out-of-home care placements, to schools, health care programs, community youth sports programs, individual tutoring, and after-school programs (e.g., YMCA, Boys & Girls Clubs of America, Big Brother and Big Sisters of America, and Swimming Australia).…”

“…The actual scope of CSA in YSOs is difficult to estimate as epidemiological data generally do not specifically identify child maltreatment in organizational settings (Kaufman et al, 2012; Wurtele, 2012). “Moreover, while the focus of this investigation is child sexual abuse, recent work in the area highlights the clustering of various forms of child maltreatment, including emotional, physical, and sexual abuse” (Dong et al, 2004; Finkelhor, Turner, Hamby, & Ormrod, 2011; Herrenkohl & Kilka, 2019).…”