Expressions of empathy in men accused of child sexual abuse

Abstract

The aim of this research was to investigate presence/absence of empathy expressions in men accused of sexual abuse against children, according to their self-reports. The study has been carried out with five participants, aged from 37 to 73 years old, accused of sexual abuse against children with up to 13 years. A bio-social-demographic protocol and a semi-structuralized interview were applied to participants. Questions accessed empathy asked how participants feeling about some situations involved children. The interviews were accomplished individually, in a single session. The participants’ answers were categorized by their content. Four kinds of answers were given: answers had focus on empathy (focus on children feelings), pragmatic answers (without expression of feelings), answers of personal distress (focused on bad feelings of the participants) and answers of positive feelings (focused on positive feelings of the participants). The participants maintain traces of general empathy.