Girls' sexual development in the inner city: from compelled childhood sexual contact to sex-for-things exchanges.
Child Sexual Abuse (CSA) has been linked to a wide variety of adverse psychological and behavioral outcomes. This paper describes girls' sexual development in the inner city based on qualitative material from a long-term ethnographic (observational) study. For many inner-city girls, early and then continued experiences of being compelled to have sex were found to be part of a pathway leading to independent sexuality that often involved prostitution, teen pregnancy, early motherhood, school dropout, limited involvement with jobs, drug abuse, multiple children by different fathers and single-parent families. Quotes from respondents illustrate the mechanics of this process and how it is sustained by the deprivations of structural disadvantage, prevailing subcultural norms, violence and illicit drug use.
Dunlap
Eloise
E
National Development and Research Institutes, Inc., 171 West 23rd Street, 8th Floor, New York, NY 10010, USA. eloise.dunlap@ndri.org
Golub
Andrew
A
Johnson
Bruce D
BD
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D002648:Child; D002650:Child Abuse, Sexual / Q000523:psychology* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D003068:Coercion; D017579:Domestic Violence / Q000523:psychology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D005260:Female; D005783:Gender Identity; D006801:Humans; D007207:Individuation; D008875:Middle Aged; D009519:New York City; D011203:Poverty / Q000523:psychology* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011247:Pregnancy; D011253:Pregnancy in Adolescence / Q000523:psychology* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011606:Psychosexual Development; D011477:Sex Work / Q000523:psychology* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D019966:Substance-Related Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000523:psychology; D014505:Urban Population / Q000706:statistics & numerical data