A well-thought statistical study.
One very thorough study in its attempt to control
for other factors that might contribute to mental illness besides CSA [child sexual abuse] surveyed
female twins (n=1411), perhaps on the
assumption that they would have similar genetic predispositions towards
substance abuse and similar developmental environments. These represent a wide range of ages “born
between 1934 and 1974.” The family
environments in which they were raised were assessed for family disruption and
“parental psychopathology,” to distinguish CSA from other causal factors. The survey identified divided CSA into three
categories: nongenital (sexual invitation, sexual kissing, and exposing);
genital (contact but no intercourse ) and intercourse (with no apparent
distinction between oral, vaginal and anal intercourse). The Odds Ratios are for twins where one
reported CSA and the other did not, or reported a “less deviant form of CSA,”
adjusted for family functioning and parental psychopathology, which might be
“genetically transmitted to their offspring.”
The OR for several psychiatric disorders (major
depression, generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, bulimia nervosa, and
substance abuse for both alcohol and other drugs) where more than two disorders
were diagnosed were 2.33 (P<.001) for any CSA; 1.42 (not significant) for non-genital
CSA; 1.78 (P<.01) for genital CSA; and 4.81 (P<.001) for intercourse.
Kenneth S. Kendler,
Cynthia M. Bulik, and Judy Silberg, et al., “Childhood Sexual Abuse and Adult
Psychiatric and Substance Use Disorders in Women: An Epidemiological and Cotwin
Control Analysis,” Archives of General
Psychiatry 57 [October, 2000], 954.
Ibid., 955.
Ibid., 958.
Ibid., 957, Table 5.
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