Asking About Manipulation in the Forensic Interview

Questioning suspected child sexual abuse victims can be facilitated when investigating interviewers have a broad understanding of techniques for grooming a child for sexual abuse. Commonly identified stages of child manipulation by groomers include victim selection, access establishment, rapport/trust development, and systematic disinhibition and desensitization. Once contact with a child is established, offenders often engage in systematic disinhibition and desensitizing activities. Such activities may include cursing, telling inappropriate jokes, showing inappropriate videos/photos, and introducing increasingly intimate physical contact. Children can experience a wide range of emotions in the course of grooming activities by the offender, so a non-judgmental  attitude by the interviewer can facilitate greater sharing by victims of grooming behaviors by an offender.