NCJ Number
182119
Journal
Journal of Addictions & Offender Counseling Volume: 20 Issue: 2 Dated: April 2000 Pages: 56-63
Editor(s)
Virginia A. Kelly
Date Published
April 2000
Length
8 pages
Annotation
The effect of a physical or sexual abuse history on student counselor attitudes toward and judgments of adolescent sex offenders was examined.
Abstract
Three hypotheses were examined: (1) Student counselor desire to work with an adolescent sex offender who has a physical or sexual abuse history would be greater than student counselor desire to work with an adolescent sex offender who has no reported abuse history; (2) Student counselor opinions of a physically or sexually abused adolescent sex offender's need for counseling would be greater than counselor opinions of a non-abused adolescent sex offender's need for counseling; and (3) Student counselors with a self-reported history of sexual abuse would have different levels of desire to work with the different client types. Study participants included 236 counselors-in-training who completed the Counselor Response Form. Three case histories were constructed that presented different client personal abuse histories. Results showed that sexually abused offenders were more desirable as prospective clients than non-abused offenders. Sexually abused counselors desired to see physically abused offenders as clients over sexually abused offenders. Student counselor judgments affected the counseling relationship, and respondents did not differ in their ratings of client need for counseling based on the client being an adolescent. Implications of the findings for counseling adolescent sex offenders are discussed, and further research is recommended. 13 references and 3 tables