Neofytou, E. <br/><br/>
Childhood trauma and female sex offenders: A systematic review 

 -  2022.<br/>							 
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<br/><br/> Objectives — This review examined existing empirical literature on trauma histories of female sex offenders to investigate the effects of childhood sexual abuse along with other traumatic experiences leading to developmental traumas. Material and methods — Validated questionnaires were used to achieve our objectives; we searched for articles using the PsycInfo, PubMed, CINAHL, MEDLINE, and EMBASE databases. Inclusion criteria included studies that employed the Adverse Childhood Experience Questionnaire and the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire and were published in English from 2007 to 2020. To guide this review, article selection was performed according to Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews guidelines. After reviewing 2,039 abstracts, seventy-eight were found to meet the criteria; after removing duplicates, twelve articles were assessed for eligibility. Eventually, four abstracts based on the validated questionnaires were considered admissible; their methods involved non-randomized convenience samples of sex offenders either in prison or in treatment programs. Results — Statistics on female sex offender prosecutions were relatively low compared to victim reports of sexual abuse committed by females. Compared with males, sexual abuse perpetrated by females had more damaging effects on the victims. The results indicated that historical childhood sexual abuse was the most common type of maltreatment—along with physical abandonment, emotional abandonment, mental illness at home, and family instability due to having divorced or unmarried parents—to contribute to the development of sex offending behaviors. Conclusion — Future research should address policies that allow for early intervention and treatments focused on understanding maltreatment, in order to ameliorate the effects of child sexual abuse in the early stages of life.