Sex Offenders free essay sample

Treatment providers recognized that sex offenders evidenced had a high prevalence of cognitive distortions, or thought processes that allowed the offenders to neutralize their feelings of guilt and shame (Abel, 1989). No matter what setting that cognitive therapy is used in, its purpose is to focus on the way an individual thinks and to change any type of â€Å"thinking errors†. For our purposes, cognitive treatment is used in the correctional and community setting to help offenders think rationally and responsibly before they act. Sexual offending can vary along a broad spectrum of behaviors, from non-contact offences such as exhibitionism to contact offenses such as rape. Much of the research on the nature of sexual offending has focused on one end of this spectrum, concentrating on understanding offences such as rape, incest and child molesting. The research has also varied in how it categorizes sex offenders. In the best of the studies on recidivism of sex offenders, the definition of ‘sex offender’ is divided into categories. We will write a custom essay sample on Sex Offenders or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page This paper will focus on sex offenders who commit crimes of sexual violence against children within their own families and whether or not cognitive treatment works on reducing recidivism. My research will finally prove that cognitive treatment is the best treatment along with focusing just on child molesters versus grouping them with rapists and other sexual offenders. These offenders are known as child molesters or incest offenders. Cognitive treatment for sex offenders has proved to be successful even if it reduces recidivism but not much. Maletzky and Steinhauser (2002) assessed at 5-year intervals, and over a 25-year span and found that cognitive/behavioral treatment for most offenders appeared effective when provided in individual and group therapy, as measured by self-reports, criminal records reviews, and, when available, by plethysmograph and polygraph assessments. They acknowledge that the method had limitations, it however still appears that the treatment techniques employed in a cognitive/behavioral program generated long-lasting, positive results by reducing recidivism and risk to the community. Gelb (2007) believes that sex offenders have criminogenic needs including the cognitive distortions about victims and offending behavior and found in her research that the overall evidence does show small but significant reductions in sexual recidivism and improvements in offenders’ attitudes following cognitive-behavioral treatments. Prentky and Schwartz (2006) believe that a powerful statistical technique for looking at the question of how effectively treatment reduces recidivism is meta-analysis. In one study that used meta-analyses of treatment studies, Hall (1995) found a small but significant overall where the effect size for treatment was stronger in those studies that used cognitive-behavior therapy or anti-androgen medication. Cognitive-behavior therapy and anti-androgen medication were significantly more effective than behavioral techniques, such as covert sensitization or aversion. Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) is a cognitive-behavioral therapy developed by Marsha Linehan and intended for self-harming clients who meet the criteria for borderline personality disorder (Linehan, 1993). DBT was designed to make use of standard cognitive behavioral techniques (such as cognitive restructuring, contingency management, problem solving, self-instructional training and skills practice) including key features that allow the therapist to handle a difficult and challenging client group. One of the clinical similarities is cognitive dysregulation refers both to cognitive disturbances (such as psychotic-type hallucinations and intrusive thoughts), and to cognitive rigidity and ‘black and white thinking†. This technique along with time and practice, can be integrated into the structure of any cognitive-behavioral treatment program for sexual offenders and reduce recidivism. Method The experiment will be conducted at the Duval County Prison. Participants will be given a questionnaire after treatment of cognitive therapy to prove that cognitive treatment is the best treatment for child molesters or sex offenders. Participants Participants will include all male child molesters or sex offenders held in the Duval County Jail in Jacksonville, FL. Participants will have to be male, 18 years of age or older, and method of offending along with the nature of victim selection is adequately defined as belonging to one of the following categories: child molesters, female victims: men who molested at most two female children in a situational context and child molesters, male victims: men who molested at most one male child. Dependent Measure Participants will answer the Clarke Sex History Questionnaire for Males-Revised to measure if the treatment worked. Questionnaire consists of 508-item self-report used to check a wide array of usual and abnormal sexual behaviors in an adult male population. Questionnaire can be located by Langevin, Ron; Paitch, Dan. 1999-2002. Yearbook: 16. Experimental Groups The group of child molesters will be randomly assigned to different groups. Therapy group members will receive cognitive treatment in a group setting, three days a week for a full hour for six months. Group members will also receive individual therapy on a weekly basis for hour sessions for six months. Therapy, group setting and individual setting, will focus on understanding their offending, improving empathy with the victim, managing negative moods, building relationship skills, and managing both internal and external factors that put the person at risk of reoffending. Control group members will not receive any type of treatment. During the time that the treatment group members are receiving group and individual counseling; control group will have time to surf the web or go to the library for the total six months The study that will be researched is an experimental study due to the fact that we are deliberately changing one or more process variables in order to observe the effect the changes have on one or more response variables. The design is a between-subjects design because it involves two different groups of people under different conditions even though all are child molesters. Confounding will be controlled by using random assignment to insure that each participant has an equal chance of being assigned to either the treatment group or the no treatment group, matching to control for confounding unrelated variables by having the rooms where therapy and no therapy is done along with the information being addresses equal to both groups, holding the extraneous variable constant by having only male child molester in the study, and analysis of covariance which will control for child molesters who victimize only males or only females.