Internet Sex Offender Assessments - Forensic Psychology

ISSUES IN FORENSIC PSYCHOLOGY
Internet Sex Offender Assessments

When assessing "chat room" sex offenders, it is necessary to distinguish between two different groups. Fantasy-driven offenders seek cybersex without any intention to meet offline. Contact-driven offenders seek offline sexual behavior with their victims.
Compared to contact-driven offenders, fantasy-driven offenders exhibit greater control and are less inclined to act on their deviant interests.
Except for one controversial study, the accumulated data indicate that possessing child pornography is not a risk factor for committing hands-on offenses (assuming that the offender in question has no history of hands-on offenses).
A U.K. study compared child molesters and pornography offenders, on probation, over an 18 month follow-up.
Compared to the 29% of child molesters who reoffended while on probation, only 4% of the pornography offenders reoffended.
None of the pornography offenders missed any supervision or treatment sessions during the course of the follow-up. Eight percent of the child molesters missed treat supervision sessions, and 13% missed treatment sessions.
Child molesters were significantly more likely to drop out of treatment (18%) compared to pornography offenders (4%).