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Abstract
The present article aims at providing an overview of the current state of research about child sexual abuse occurring in youth-serving institutions and about the individuals who have sexually offended against children with whom they work. Depending on the specific institution and the assessment method used, between 0.1% and 10% of all children and adolescents who were placed in a youth-serving institution have been sexually victimized. In most cases offenders are male and highly educated. Compared to child sexual abusers (CSA) not working with children pedophilic sexual interests seem to be more prevalent in child sexual abusers working with children (CSA-W), while indicators for antisocial behaviors can be found less often. In line with this constellation of risk factors CSA-W primarily reoffend sexually. Thus, risk assessment instruments that specifically measure the risk for sexual recidivism perform best in CSA-W. Concerning offence-supportive strategies previous research found that CSA-W use manipulative behaviors rather than violence prior to the abuse and the abuse most commonly occurs when the CSA-W is alone with the victim. Based on these findings it can be concluded that treatment with CSA-W should focus primarily on the management of pedophilic sexual interests as well as on the relationship problems. However, future research still has to evaluate the impact of psychotherapeutic treatment on these offenders and has to identify additional risk factors that should be considered in treatment approaches.
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