Submitted by crinadmin on
Bengt Soderstrom is a Clinical psychologist working on cases of sexual abuse in Stockholm, Sweden. Speaking at the Council of Europe’s child rights strategy meeting, he gave his take on internet-related sexual violence against children. There is an increasing amount of internet-related sexual violence in which children are groomed or seduced over the internet. The effects that I have come across of internet-related violence on these children are similar to those of other children who have been sexually abused but they need help in certain other areas. This is because if pictures of the child are distributed online the pictures will still be out there - the abuse continues and doesn’t end after disclosure. We must learn more about how to deal with these additional complications. There are also issues here relating to shame and guilt, for example a child may be seduced into smiling and people looking at them may believe they are happy: it is a complex abuse experience. The risk factors are the same as for other types of abuse: poverty, emotional loneliness, lack of trust in adults and self-esteem. For children who have been abandoned or have a low sense of self-worth, easy way to make money and to find attention. It is easier to trust adults and seek help if a child has been an agent in disclosing the abuse. In most cases children do not disclose the abuse themselves. In this case, the process that a child goes through in deciphering the manipulation they have been subjected to is much longer. If we are not aware of how to deal with this, we may risk re-traumatising the child by asking too much about the pictures and not thinking about other things, we also need to be careful not to show pictures to others, for example to parents or to use them in lectures to explain how to tackle this kind of abuse. As psychologists here in Sweden we have a mandatory reporting process whereby if we know of a case which presents dangers to other children we must report a case which is disclosed to us. If we are asked about specific details relating to a child’s case, for example, how the child felt about the abuse, we can keep this confidential. We need to learn much more about the complications of internet-related violence; there is a real need for more specialised training and funding. In terms of legislation, we must look at things from the child’s perspective and think about who has access to pictures, how they are filed and kept as evidence: the child is the one who should be in charge of who has access to this. When I started out in this job I thought I would feel sad at the end of each day. In fact I have found that I often feel very happy. There are a lot of children who want to get help and see a person who is familiar with what they have experienced and I have the opportunity to help children who think their lives are over. Another part of our work is to do group therapy and some children have said they didn’t realise that group therapy could actually be fun. If I could give other people working on issues of sexual violence one piece of advice I would say: help children to meet other children with similar experiences to them and to develop the skills to talk about what really happened. Ask, don’t tell.