Psychotherapeutic Issues in the Treatment of Sexually Abused Girls

Abstract

Experience in treating both accidental and participating victims of sexual assault suggests that while most of the adolescent accidental victims responded well to crisis intervention therapy, both of the latency accidental victims and all of the participating victims required a much longer period of therapy to obtain any relief of symptoms. Long-term therapy was characterized by much testing of the therapist either in the form of seductive behaviors in the case of male therapists or aggressively provocative behaviors in the case of female therapists. The most common symptoms encountered in latency children were phobias, behavior disorders, and learning disturbances, while in adolescents depression was most often seen.