Infant and Child Sexuality: A Sociological Perspective - Ipce

ambled over her small body. This presented a
problem I had not thought of and I sickened...
The best account that I know of in the literature on the ambivalent
attitudes of a child toward molestation by an adult is in an account
by Maya Angelou (1970, p. 94-98). She provides a graphic and
moving account of a child’s response to the tenderness, as well as to
the violence, that can accompany intimate, sexual encounters with an
adult. In good faith she cooperates and receives certain satisfactions
only later to be deeply hurt by rape, extreme feelings of guilt, and
the threat of violence by the molester should she tell of the experience
to anyone. The events that follow an occasion of child molestation
can be as traumatic or more traumatic for both parties than the
precipitating event itself. Intimacy is a normal part of the maturational
process of children, and even child molestation, if no violent
aggression or physical harm accompanies the activity, need not create
sexual trauma for the child. Distress, anger, and anxiety of parents, a
police investigation, and a court trial may have more traumatic effect
on the child than the sexual experience itself. The aggressor in such a
child-adult encounter is generally assumed to be the adult. The reader
is again referred to Angelou’s perceptive account of a raped child as
seen through the eyes of an offended child.
A major difference between the child and the adult in a child-adult
intimate encounter is that the adult is likely aware that there are
statues which severely threaten his freedom if he is caught. The written
codes and the prescriptions of the common law are not influential
in controlling the child’s sexual behavior. His childhood experiences
are behind him before he has any comprehension of the nature of the legal
proscriptions of adult sex codes. (Kinsey, 1948, p. 447).
Results of Sexual Encounters In Early Childhood
More and more authorities on child development are accepting intimate
and even sexual encounters as a normal part of the maturational
process. (Katzman, 1972). Child sexuality is being seen in a broad context.
No longer do we feel that early discovery of genital differences,
child-child sex play, or even a single occurrence of sexual
molestation will have lasting ill effects on a child involved in a stable
pattern of ongoing family and community experiences. Healthy children
are not as easily upset by sexual experiences as some theorists
would have us believe. Feeling the genitals of another child, getting a
glimpse of the parent undressed, or a look at a “girly” magazine does
not seriously disturb the average child. (Finch, 1969). The child that
is traumatized by the sight of a nude body, or by learning that intercourse
occurs, or by learning that babies grow inside of the mother has
previously developed a background of experience such that sooner or
later, in one context or another, he would have been unable to cope
with sexual stimuli. (Gagnon, 1965).
There is no one universal reaction to the discovery of genital differences
of the sexes, for instance. There exists varying degrees of
acceptance, and the emotional tone accompanying the discovery is frequently
one of serenity. (Conn, 1940). Children generally accept the
differences between the sexes with composure though some have a feeling
of strangeness, surprise, curiosity, disappointment, or humor.
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