A Canadian study conducted on 701 adult men who were patients in the
Kurt Freund Laboratory of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health found some interesting similarities in the life histories of some types of sex offenders. Before I describe the findings, bear with a few definitions so that the findings make some sense.
The men were divided into four groups based on their histories and their responses to sexual materials. They were:
- Pedophiles: Men sexually interested in prepubescent children (114 men)
- Hebephiles: Men sexually interested in pubescent children ( 377 men)
- Teleiophilic Offenders: Men sexually interested in adults and who had committed a sexual offense against an adult (139)
- Teleiophilic Non-Offenders: Men sexually interested in adults and who had no known history of any sexual offenses ( 71 men).
The researchers examined many aspects of these four groups of men. What showed up was this: When compared to Teleiophilic Offenders, the Pedophilic and Hebephiles and Pedophiles showed about double the odds of failing a grade in school or being enrolled in special education classes.
There were no significant differences between the Teleiophilic Offenders and the Teleiophilic Non-Offenders on these two facets of their history. The four groups studied showed rates of grade failure or special education placement of approximately 30 to 60%. These are much higher than that of the general population.
The researchers concluded that these findings were consistent with the hypothesis that an erotic age preference for children sometimes results from what they called a "perturbation of neurodevelopment" occurring in early life -- specifically prenatally or perinatally. They did not specify in their publication in Archives of Sexual Behavior, Dec. 2006 what the "perturbations" would be but the inclusion of both "before" birth and "just after birth" offers us much to think about -- from genetics, to pregnancy conditions, to trauma and injuries.
It is important not to hop on some runaway train with this research. This does not mean that men who have had special education or failed a grade should be hunted down, forced out of town, or put on some list. These men all probably drank milk as well.
What is interesting is that the men who were sex offenders of children often (though not always) had markers of neurological impairment. This is one very interesting step toward understanding the multifactorial path in which many circumstances join together to result in pedophilia or hebephilia and much, much less often resulting in sex offense directed toward adult victims.
Why do I mention the research at all? To suggest that there may be room for a small amount of compassion toward such offenders -- along the same lines of the often quoted, " Hate the sin, but love the sinner." I look forward to a day when our knowledge of the causes of sex offenses are so well understood that our society could curtail them all together.
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