2005
DOI: 10.1007/s11194-005-5057-0
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The Criminal Activity of Sexual Offenders in Adulthood: Revisiting the Specialization Debate

Abstract: Two major hypotheses have been put forward to describe the criminal activity of sexual offenders in adulthood. The first hypothesis states that sexual offenders are specialists who tend to repeat sexual crimes. The second hypothesis describes sexual offenders as generalists who do not restrict themselves to one particular type of crime. The current state of knowledge provides empirical support for both the specialization and the generality hypothesis. The presence of both generality and specialization in the o… Show more

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Cited by 65 publications
(93 citation statements)
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References 76 publications
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“…Sex offenders tend to specialise more than other offenders, as they relatively frequently re-offend sexually when compared with non-sex offenders (Hanson, Scott, & Steffy, 1995;Langan, Schmitt, & Durose, 2003;Sample & Bray, 2003). Some sex offenders specialise more than others (Harris, Smallbone, Dennison, & Knight, 2009;Lussier, 2005;Miethe, Olson, & Mitchell, 2006;Soothill, Francis, Sanderson, & Ackerley, 2000): child abusers, for instance, tend to specialise more than sex offenders with an older or adult victim (Knight & Prentky, 1993;Knight & Sims-Knight, 2003).…”
Section: Criminal Career Researchmentioning
confidence: 99%
See 1 more Smart Citation
“…Sex offenders tend to specialise more than other offenders, as they relatively frequently re-offend sexually when compared with non-sex offenders (Hanson, Scott, & Steffy, 1995;Langan, Schmitt, & Durose, 2003;Sample & Bray, 2003). Some sex offenders specialise more than others (Harris, Smallbone, Dennison, & Knight, 2009;Lussier, 2005;Miethe, Olson, & Mitchell, 2006;Soothill, Francis, Sanderson, & Ackerley, 2000): child abusers, for instance, tend to specialise more than sex offenders with an older or adult victim (Knight & Prentky, 1993;Knight & Sims-Knight, 2003).…”
Section: Criminal Career Researchmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Such studies have the disadvantage that they investigate only the first new offence and do not take into account any patterning of offences over the entire career. In addition, recidivism studies may be difficult to compare because of differences in follow-up time and sample composition (Lussier, 2005). As far as we are aware, only Soothill et al (2000) have researched the entire criminal career of male sex offenders.…”
Section: Criminal Career Researchmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Until recently (Blokland & Lussier, in press), the examination of the offending behavior of sex offenders had been a circumspect one. Researchers have limited their investigations to the following three criminal activity features: (a) frequency, and to a lesser extent λ; (b) recidivism or the likelihood of being re-arrested again during a determined follow-up period, and; (c) crime specialization (e.g., Hanson & Bussière, 1998;Lussier, 2005;Soothill, 2010). To our knowledge, the concept of criminal achievement in sex offending has never been examined.…”
mentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Furthermore, current research suggests that sexual offenders rarely restrict their criminal activities to sexual offenses (Harris, Knight, Smallbone, & Dennison, 2011;Lussier, 2005). Moreover, CSA-W rated the probability that they would abuse another child in the future much higher than those CSA who did not work with children (these differences showed the highest effect sizes).…”
Section: Discussionmentioning
confidence: 76%