Interpreting Child Sexual Abuse: Empathy and Offense-Supportive Cognitions among Child Sex Offenders.

Researchers have suggested that child sex offenders hold distorted views on social interactions with children. Misinterpreting children's behavior and intentions could lead to sexually abusive behavior toward children. It is further suggested that the interpretation process is influenced by offenders' offense-supportive cognitions and levels of empathy.

Interpreting child sexual abuse: the impact of victim response.

There is little empirical knowledge about whether the interpretation process of child sex offenders is offense-supportive in nature and contributes to the offending process. Vignettes were developed to compare child sex offenders' and nonoffenders' interpretations of child molestation incidents after ambiguous and nonambiguous victim responses. Results showed that child sex offenders' (N = 60) interpretations did not differ from nonoffenders' (N = 40) interpretations.

Delusional distress partly explains the relation between persecutory ideations and inpatient aggression on the ward.

Previous research showed that there is an association between persecutory delusions and inpatient aggression. However, it is not clear why some persons act upon their delusions with aggression. Research showed that persons with persecutory delusions have higher levels of delusional distress resulting from these delusions.