Female Sex Offenders: What Therapists, Law Enforcement and Child Protective Services Need to Know [Paperback]

Julia Hislop (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review

A much needed resource. Hislop has done a good job pulling together the research in this area. -- Connie Schenk, Juvenile Forensics Psychologist

Well-documented introduction to an area that has... been ensconced in silence... Suitable for all areas of corrections. -- Gayle L. Turner, Corrections Compendium, Oct. 2001

Product Description

For everyone responsible for the well being of children, this book explains one of the hardest to detect threats to their safety.

Female sex offenders have victimized an estimated two to three million people in the United States. As a society we find it nearly impossible to believe that females, usually seen as nurturing, are capable of sexual abuse.

The result is that, each year, hundreds of thousands of youth are not protected, not believed, and not treated for the trauma associated with the abuse. Through her detailed analysis of the currently available literature and her own research, Dr. Hislop describes what is known about female sex offenders: identification of abusers, estimates of the number of abusers and victims, the methods of abuse, the types of trauma seen among their victims, and what is known about the developmental histories of female sex offenders.

She also provides therapists with directions for treatment and prioritized treatment goals, including exploring the victimization and patterns of offending, the relationship between the offender’s own victimization and her offending, precursors to offending, and methods to stop offending.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 247 pages
• Publisher: Issues Press (July 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1930461003
• ISBN-13: 978-1930461000
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.8 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #1,138,064 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars fascinating study, November 16, 2006

By	Haseeb (Tempe, AZ United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Female Sex Offenders: What Therapists, Law Enforcement and Child Protective Services Need to Know (Paperback)

Many people talk about how bad it is when girls are molested by men... "oh how terrible, what a creep, they should lock him up and throw away the key", etc. Very little is said about female offenders and their victims however, particularly when the victims are teenaged boys. Hislop, who is a practicing therapist makes such oversights much more difficult given the evidence she presents in this study which is written like a scholarly monograph. She references many professionals who are specialists in the field and also presents results from studies of her own.

I didn't read this entire book cover to cover, because parts of it are written more for practicing threrapists, particularly the last part. Much of the book however is accessible to the average educated person. A lot of interesting results were presented. Based on other things I've read and heard, much of the information in this book is not new, but some of it however is quite shocking.

I already knew that female offenders tend to come from chaotic or dysfunctional backgrounds where alcoholism, drug abuse, physical/sexual abuse is the norm. It's also relatively well known that women from such backgrounds tend to select life partners who will re-activate this chaos, if they select a "good guy" however they will do something in their relationship to sabotage it (i.e. commit incest, abuse their kids, cheat, abuse drugs/alcohol, etc.).

Some of the interesting information which I didn't know are the following assertions, which has been confirmed by professionals in the field:

-Men who were incest victims by their mothers tend to suffer from serious psychosomatic symptoms and depression as adults, social dysfunction and are hindered in cognitive development.

-The majority of serial rapists have had sexual contact with grown women as children/adolescents.

-Rapists are sexually victimized more by females than males.

So many people think that boys who are victimized by grown women are lucky. After reading this book, we learn that boys who are victimized by women are hardly lucky. And the women who victimize them... they more often than not are complete messes socially and mentally.

14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Female Sex Offenders, December 3, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Female Sex Offenders: What Therapists, Law Enforcement and Child Protective Services Need to Know (Paperback)

As a licensed clinical psychologist, I feel that this is a well written and very well researched book. It shows a lot of insight into a very newly researched field of psychology as well as a practical approach for helping professionals to aid and understand the victums.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very enlightening, March 16, 2006

By	R. Wilson "TimeTraveler" (Albuquerque, NM USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Female Sex Offenders: What Therapists, Law Enforcement and Child Protective Services Need to Know (Paperback)

This book is very well written and researched and I liked Ms. Hislop's factual style of writing. Not far into the book it suddenly struck me as odd that there is so much effort in understanding female sex offenders, but I do not see this same attempt at understanding male offenders ... they just go straight to prison. Is it not possible that they may also be suffering from some childhood trauma done to them or are in other ways in great need of psychological help. Maybe someone could write a book about that.