Some children and young people are more likely to experience CSA than the wider population, these include; children who are disabled, children who have been in care and children who have experienced neglect.
Sibling sexual abuse is currently the most prevalent form of child sexual abuse, estimated to be three times more common than abuse of a child by a parent (Centre of Expertise for CSA [1])
In these situations, the individual who has been harmed and the individual who
has harmed are both children. This brings added complexity and can lead to confused and confusing responses by professionals. Therefore, responding this form of abuse is reliant on understanding the nature and consequences of the abuse.
Sibling sexual abuse can be every bit as harmful as sexual abuse by a parent or family member, with both short and long-term effects on physical and mental health. Professionals should assess the risk rather than make assumptions to ensure this type of abuse is fully understood. Children who have sexually abused a child sibling may often have experienced abuse and trauma themselves and must be given appropriate support, alongside a robust assessment to understand if family disfunction has had an impact.
Professionals should also be mindful not to label children as perpetrators, instead they have or may have demonstrated harmful or sexually harmful behaviours that need to be fully understood.
| Practice TipRefer to the Brook Traffic Light Tool [2] to help you to assess behaviour that could be considered as healthy sexual development in comparison to behaviour which could indicate that sibling sexual abuse is occurring. A practical research paper on sibling sexual abuse can be found here [3]. |
To provide feedback on this toolkit please click this link [4]
You can also scan the QR code below to take you to the survey:
