International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology

Attachment and Pedophilia

Adult Attachment Style and Pedophilia:

A Developmental Perspective
Gary A. Sawle
Jon Kear-Colwell

Abstract: In this study, attachment theory was applied to three samples: male university stu-
dents (controls), male nonoffending victims of sexual assault, and convicted male pedophiles.
Adult attachment styles are investigated along with developmental histories of neglect, punish-
ment, and sexual and physical abuse. It is proposed that adult attachment styles will differ
among the pedophiles and the other two groups, and the duration of participants adult sexual
relationships would vary with the amount of sexual and other trauma that they reported experi-
encing as young people. If these were confirmed, it would indicate that attachment style was a
significant factor in the developmental history of pedophiles and male victims of sexual
assault. The results of this study indicated that the victims and controls experienced more secu-
rity of attachment than the pedophiles, who were found to have an insecure attachment style.
Victims and pedophiles were found to have experienced similar levels of early abuse and
trauma.

Recent work in the area of pedophilia has indicated a relationship between early
experiences of intimate relationships and the reported difficulties that pedophiles
have with intimacy (Hudson & Ward, 1997; Marshall, 1993; Ward, Hudson,
Marshall, & Siegert, 1995). Attachment theory as developed by Bowlby (1969,
1973, 1980) may well be the bridge between early attachment experiences and the
intimacy problems displayed by pedophiles (Marshall, 1993). The experimental
work has so far been carried out with samples of pedophiles and men from the
general population. What has been missing is the intermediate group of victims
who have not offended against children. A nonoffending victim group is neces-
sary in order to understand the possible relationships between attachment styles,
pedophilic behaviour, and victimisation.
Developmental psychopathology relates to the study of the origins and course
of individual patterns of behavioral maladaption (Sroufe & Rutter, 1984), and in
line with this approach, early sexual experiences can set the scene for an ongoing
sexual interest in children (Groth, 1982). The quality of the early attachment to a
primary caregiver can contribute to styles of coping employed under stressful
conditions in adult interpersonal relationships (Feeney, 1995) and may also con-

NOTE: Address all correspondence to Jon Kear-Colwell, Senior Lecturer in Forensic Psychology,
School of Social Sciences and Liberal Studies, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst, NSW 2795, Austra-
lia, or e-mail: jkearcolwell@csu.edu.au.
International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, 45(1), 2001 32-50
2001 Sage Publications, Inc.
32
Attachment and Pedophilia 33

tribute to a susceptibility for normal adult sexual behaviour to be displaced toward

children as sexual partners (Marshall, 1993).
Although a proportion of pedophiles have been sexually abused as children,
this experience is probably not a sufficient condition for the victim to develop an
adult sexual interest in children (Finkelhor, 1990; Rind, Tromovitch, &
Bauserman, 1998). Research that attempts to tease out any of the developmental
precursors of pedophilia has importance, as it could have implications for the
development of successful treatment strategies.
A theory of developmental psychopathology can be found in Bowlbys attach-
ment theory (1969, 1973, 1979, 1980). In Bowlbys model, an infant develops the
active cognitive schemas of its caregiver and the surrounding environment,
employing them to predict the caregivers behaviour and to regulate its own. In
this way, the infant achieves a feeling of security and ultimately internalises the
attachment experience, learning caregiving as it experiences care (Alexander,
1992). A persons self-image is shaped by their early attachment experiences
(Sroufe & Fleeson, 1986). The consequence of these developmental interactions
is manifested in an individuals style of attachment, which continues throughout
childhood (Main & Cassidy, 1988) into adulthood (Weiss, 1982) and into adult
love relationships (Feeney & Noller, 1990; Hendrick & Hendrick, 1989).
Although continuity of attachment style is supported by the above work, there is a
lack of solid longitudinal evidence to fully confirm the relationship between
childhood and adult styles of attachment.
Three primary attachment styles found in childhood have been identified by
Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, and Wall (1978): secure, anxious avoidant, and anx-
ious ambivalent resistant. These represent organised strategies that an infant uses
to negotiate separation anxiety and reunion with the primary caregiver (Cicchetti,
Toth, & Lynch, 1995). The state of separation is a salient event in attachment the-
ory (Bowlby, 1973). These attachment styles have been identified in adults, and
they influence ways in which behavioural and attitudinal aspects of sexuality are
experienced (Brennan & Shaver, 1995).

Attachment and Emotional Regulation

Securely attached children demonstrate more social competence and flexibil-
ity in managing emotions and impulses, and experience greater ego resilience
than anxiously attached children (Sroufe & Waters, 1977). Children who experi-
ence empathic responses to stress and trust their caregiver are able to function
empathically in response to others. Conversely, children who experience separa-
tion or rejection when emotionally distressed are characteristically unempathic.
Ambivalent-resistant childrens preoccupation with anxiety and dependency also
interferes with empathic processes (Sroufe, 1988) and anxious-avoident children
expect to be rejected as a result of their caregivers hostility and aversion to con-
tact (Sroufe, 1996).
34 International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology

Research into affect regulation and attachment styles in young adults has indi-
cated similar patterns of emotional response (Kobak & Sceery, 1988; Mikulincer,
Florian, & Tomalcz, 1990). It is evident that attachment styles influence the regu-
lation of negative affect and coping strategies for stressful situations (Lazarus &
Folkman, 1984). It has also been found that adolescents have differing percep-
tions of self according to their attachment styles (Mikulincer, 1995).
Adults who are more securely attached feel more valued by others, and those
who have experienced rejection tend to feel undervalued and worthless
(Mikulincer, 1995). Adults who perceive themselves as having high self-esteem
are more securely attached when compared with anxious-ambivalent individuals
(Bartholomew & Horowitz, 1991) and also when compared with anxious-
avoidant individuals (Feeney & Noller, 1990).

Attachment and Cognitive Schema

The quality of interaction and experience between a child and his or her care-
giver contributes to the formation of internal working models that function as
interpersonal cognitive schema across the life span (Bowlby, 1973). These
schema influence emotional responses and influence the manner in which an indi-
vidual appraises a social situation in order to maintain a coherent image of self
(Collins, 1996; Collins & Read, 1990, 1994). Such schema are developed from
interactions with a caregiver and serve to predict and maintain self-other adult
relationships (Hamman et al., 1995). These schema also provide the basis for cop-
ing strategies that are used to deal with attachment-sensitive social and emotional
distress (Feeney & Noller, 1996).

Attachment and the Development of Sexual Pathology

Negative environmental factors such as family conflict and stress can contrib-
ute to the development of psychopathology in insecurely attached individuals,
whereas securely attached individuals who experience stress fail to develop
psychopathology or pedophilia (Finkelhor, 1990; Lewis, Feiring, McGuffog, &
Jaskir, 1984; Rind et al., 1998). From this perspective, an individual can develop a
vulnerability to environmental problems depending on the nature of their early
attachment experiences. Disturbances in the developmental continuity of attach-
ment may limit an adults ability to have their needs met appropriately, regulate
their emotional well-being, respond empathically to the needs of others, and seek
assistance to ameliorate abusive behaviours. The above personal characteristics
have been found to be lacking in individuals who sexually abuse children (Pithers,
Kashima, Cummings, Beal, & Buell, 1988).
The negative effects of sexual abuse do not represent a discrete set of character-
istics (Finklehor, 1990; Rind et al., 1998). The range of emotional and cognitive
traits exhibited by victims of abuse is thought to be mediated by attachment expe-
rience, with the insecure attachment often preceding the sexual abuse (Alexander,
Attachment and Pedophilia 35

1992). It is also believed that a proportion of victims of sexual abuse may not be
significantly affected by their abuse experience if they were not abused by a father
figure and were supported by a well-adjusted family (Finklehor, 1990; Rind et al.,
1998). The quality of an abuse victims primary attachment relationship can
determine the impact of this experience (Egeland & Sroufe, 1981; Moncher,
1996). A developmental association has, however, been noted between caregiver
inconsistency, changes in caregivers, abusive sexual deviation in the family, and
sexual aggression in adults (Prentky et al., 1989).
Early deviant sexual experiences may serve as a template for later deviant sex-
ual behaviours, and inconsistent caregiving serves to undermine the security of
attachment; all this contributes to disturbances in an individuals ability to form
intimate relationships (Hudson & Ward, 1997; Marshall, 1989). An adult who has
not developed a secure attachment system may construe early abusive sexual
experiences as enticing because they represent a form of intimacy regardless of
their deviant nature. Consequently, males who have not experienced secure
attachment may be vulnerable to placating intimacy needs by engaging in
pedophilic behaviour (Ward, Hudson, & Marshall, 1996), particularly when inter-
personal stressors such as relationship dissolution, rejection, and separation
threaten their intimacy needs (Marshall, 1989). In contrast, those who have devel-
oped a secure attachment in childhood may be more resilient to interpersonal
trauma and intimacy problems (Masten & OConnor, 1989). A securely attached
sexual abuse victim may not become a child sexual abuser because resilience in
the form of secure attachment may contribute to an individuals ability to deal
with relationships and stressors.
Pedophiles may be characterised by different styles of insecure attachment
(Hudson & Ward, 1997; Ward et al., 1995; 1996), and it is possible that being sex-
ually abused in childhood may contribute to the development of attachment inse-
curity (Prentky et al., 1989). It is of note that persons who have overcome early
trauma have been found to have had supportive caregivers (Simpson & Rholes,
1994). A securely attached individual copes more constructively with interper-
sonal stress, and such constructive coping helps to strengthen relationships. Sig-
nificant stress, however, tends to weaken the relationship quality in the insecurely
attached. It would seem that separation anxiety and proximity-seeking behaviour
are powerful indicators of attachment style. Attachment theory may explain the
processes of how and why intimate relationships figure crucially in how we feel
about and adjust to life circumstances (Hazan & Shaver, 1994; Hazan, Zeifman, &
Middleton, 1994) and how such relationships can become sexually and more gen-
erally deviant.

AIMS OF THIS STUDY

This study examines the relationship between abuse history and attachment.
This association is explored according to the attachment styles described by
36 International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology

Feeney, Noller, and Hanrahan (1994), which were partly derived from the theoret-
ical frameworks of Ainsworth et al. (1978) and Bartholomew (1990) and further
informed by the work of Ward et al. (1995, 1996). In the Feeny et al. (1994) model,
individuals who are able to confidently seek support in times of interpersonal
stress, openly discuss interpersonal difficulties, and experience a positive view of
self and others can be identified as being securely attached. In contrast, insecurely
attached individuals may be identified according to four constructs. These styles
of insecure attachment have been derived from Ainsworth et al.s (1978) descrip-
tions of anxious and avoidant childhood attachment styles. They indicate a childs
expectations concerning their caregivers accessibility and responsiveness, and
they become activated under conditions of interpersonal anxiety, fear, or separation.
These anxious and avoidant attachment styles have been extrapolated by
Bartholomew (1990), Feeney et al. (1994), and Hazan and Shaver (1994) and rep-
resent adult styles of responding to interpersonal situations. There is evidence that
childhood attachment styles persist into adulthood but can be modified by envi-
ronmental change (Stein, Jacobs, Ferguson, Allen, & Fonagy, 1998).
Anxious attachment is represented by two styles of insecure attachment:

Preoccupied with relationships, which indicates a negative view of self and a positive
view of others, significant anxiety associated with the possibility of abandonment
and relationship loss and a strong desire for interpersonal acceptance and confirma-
tion as a result of high dependency needs. Such individuals have difficulties in main-
taining intimacy with adult partners and may be vulnerable to establishing affective
relationships with children, who may more easily fulfill their emotional needs
(Batholomew, 1990; Hazan & Shaver, 1994; Ward et al., 1995).
Need for approval, which indicates a highly negative view of self based on the notion of
not being good enough to receive the desired approval. Such insecure individuals
desire emotional endorsement but remain doubtful that others may be able to
accommodate their need for self-esteem. Such individuals tend to perceive age peers
as being disparaging and are acutely sensitive to rejection, so they avoid intimate
relationships (Shaver & Hazan, 1988). Pedophiles with this style of attachment
remain emotionally unconnected with the victim, seeking only impersonal sexual
satisfaction (Ward et al., 1995).

Avoidant attachment is delineated by two styles of insecure attachment:

Discomfort with closeness relates to a lack of self-confidence in interpersonal relations

and fears that allowing others to become close might cause hurt. These individuals
have a desire to remain aloof and distant from others as a response to rejection
(Hazan & Shaver, 1994), and their sexual experiences are likely to be impersonal.
Their problems with closeness may lead them into sexual relationhips with children,
as children are less conditional in their interpersonal responses (Ward et al., 1995).
Relationships as secondary reflects self-absorption and an unwillingness to approach
others for support. A positive sense of self is maintained by emotionally dismissing
attachment figures and emphasising personal achievement and independence at the
Attachment and Pedophilia 37

expense of emotional relationships and intimacy. According to Batholomew (1990),

people who have experienced a lack of responsiveness and emotional availability
from their primary caregiver tend to devalue the importance of close relationships.
They are vulnerable to seeking sexual relations that are characteristically lacking in
intimacy and may choose children as sexual partners as a means to reduce emotional
involvement and self-disclosure (Ward et al., 1996).

Given the nexus reported in the literature between pedophilia, insecure attach-
ment styles, and early sexual abuse, the aim of this study was to investigate the re-
lationship between these factors and characteristics that may discriminate be-
tween nonoffending victims of sexual abuse and pedophiles. This is important, as
there is no research on male victims who have not gone on to display pedophilic
behaviors.

SAMPLES AND MEASURES

The pedophile sample consisted of 25 convicted men with a mean age of 37.1
years (SD = 11.9) who were recruited from custodial and community-based treat-
ment programs. Of the men approached, 35% returned the questionnaires. In this
sample, 64% reported a severely stressful childhood. In the case of childhood
sexual experiences prior to the age of 14, 40% reported that they had engaged
very often in sexual activity with an adult, with 28% stating that this type of
activity had occurred sometimes and 32% of the sample reporting that it had
never happened to them. For those pedophiles who had been abused as children,
84% reported it was by a person who was not a stranger. The offending adult for
82% of these pedophiles had been a relative.
The victim sample consisted of 22 men with a mean age of 32.8 years (SD =
14.4) who were nonoffending victims of sexual abuse that had occurred before the
age of 14. These were recruited from two community-based treatment programs.
Of the men approached, 44% returned the questionnaires. The victims reported
that 68% of them had experienced a severely stressful childhood. When report-
ing on childhood sexual experiences prior to the age of 14, 43% of the victims
stated that they had been involved very often in sexual activity with an adult,
and another 43% indicated that this sexual activity had occurred sometimes.
The other 3 victims (14%) did not respond to these questions. The offending adult
for 83% of the responding victims had not been a stranger, and 37% reported that
the offender was a relative.
The control sample consisted of 23 male part-time distance-education univer-
sity students with a mean age of 39.0 years (SD = 9.4). Of the men approached,
31% returned the questionnaires. None of the controls reported that his childhood
had been severely stressful and none stated that he had engaged in any sexual
behaviour with an adult prior to the age of 14.
38 International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology

It was determined that there were no significant differences in age between the
three samples, F(2, 67) = 1.54, ns. In terms of stressful childhood (Item 37,
Child Abuse and Trauma Scale [CAT]), there was a significant difference between
the samples, Kruskal-Wallis 2 = 32.24, df = 2, p < .001. On inspection of the mean
ranks, the significance arises from the low level of childhood stress reported by
the controls (16.70), and there was little difference between the victims (46.80)
and the pedophiles (42.86).
Potential participants were approached by their program coordinators, and the
two questionnaires were made available to the participants by means of a written
request for anonymous participation in the study. Those who volunteered mailed
their completed questionnaires directly to the principal investigator. The partici-
pants completed the two questionnaires on an individual basis in their own time.
The Attachment Style Questionnaire (ASQ), (Feeney et al., 1994) contains 40
short statements that participants rate on a scale of 1 (totally disagree) to 6 (totally
agree). The questionnaire has five factor scales that are continuous vari-
ablesone scale represents a secure adult attachment style and four represent the
insecure attachment styles that were described above.
The CAT, (Sanders & Becker-Lausen, 1995) is a 38-item questionnaire
designed to measure the frequency and extent of negative experiences in child-
hood and adolescence. The items are each rated on a scale of 0 (never) to 4
(always). The CAT scale has three subscales: (a) Sexual Abuse, (b) Neglect/Nega-
tive Home Atmosphere, and (c) Punishment. As well, 5 extra items were added to
the CAT scale by the present authors. Where sexual abuse had occurred, Ques-
tions 39 and 40 were aimed at identifying the victim-perpetrator relationship, and
Question 41 was aimed at identifying the frequency of sexual activity with an
adult. The next question, 42, was aimed at estimating the maximum duration of
any adult-to-adult sexual relationship that had been experienced, and Question 43
attempted to identify the number of adult-to-adult sexual relationships the partici-
pant had experienced. Two versions of the CAT were used, one for the controls
and victims and the other for the pedophiles. In Question 42, the pedophile ver-
sion specified adult-to-adult sexual relationships outside of prison. The higher the
scores on the subscales, the higher the level of neglect and abuse, so an overall
level of total abuse could be obtained by summing the three subscale scores.

RESULTS

Data Analysis
All analyses of variance (ANOVAs) were carried out using the Statistical Pack-
age for the Social Sciences (SPSS 7.5, 1998), and the post hoc planned compari-
sons between the individual means used the Tamhane T2 test. This latter test is not
dependent on homogeneity of variance. Due to the relatively small number of par-
Attachment and Pedophilia 39

ticipants, it was decided to accept a probability level of p < .01 as being significant
in comparisons between the three samples.

Styles of Attachment (ASQ)

There were significant differences in attachment styles between the three
groups, with both controls and victims recording significantly higher scores on
the Confidence (secure attachment style) scale than the pedophiles (see Table 1).
There was a significant difference between the groups with respect to Relation-
ships as Secondary (insecure attachment style), with the pedophiles scoring sig-
nificantly higher than the controls and victims. There was no significant differ-
ence between the controls and victims on either the Confidence or the
Relationships as Secondary factor scales.
There was a difference between the groups that was approaching significance
for this study (p = .014) in relation to Preoccupied with Relationships. The victims
scored at a level approaching significance for this study (p = .033) that was higher
than the controls, but there was no significant difference between the pedophiles
and the controls or the victims.
There were no significant differences between the controls, victims, and
pedophiles with respect to Discomfort With Closeness and, similarly, there was
no significant difference in relation to Need for Approval between controls, vic-
tims, and pedophiles.
However, if the four insecure attachment style scores were summed into a total
score, the overall position, as determined by a one-way ANOVA, was that there
was a highly significant difference between the three groups, F(2, 67) = 6.42, p <
.005, with no significant difference between the victims and the pedophiles, but
both the pedophiles (p = .010, Tamhane T2 test, M = 113.28, SD = 18.52) and the
victims (p = .006, Tamhane T2 test, M = 114.68, SD = 18.00) were significantly
more insecurely attached than the controls (M = 98.00, SD = 15.89). The mean
scores for the victims and the pedophiles were almost identical (p = .991,
Tamhane T2 test). The major difference between the victims and the pedophiles
was that the victims were more like the controls than they were the pedophiles on
Confidence and Relationships as Secondary. The nonoffending victims do have
issues with insecure attachments, but at the same time are securely attached; there
is a different pattern of attachments in the victims when compared with the
pedophiles.

Duration of Adult Sexual Relationships

(CAT Item 42) and Attachment Style
It was found that pedophiles who had an insecure attachment style had shorter
term adult sexual relationships than did controls and victims. This was true for
Relationships as Secondary (p < .001) and low Confidence (low secure attach-
ment) (p < .001).
40 International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology

TABLE 1
RESEARCH GROUP AND ATTACHMENT STYLE (ONE-WAY ANOVA)

Attachment Style
Insecure Insecure
Insecure Preoccupation Discomfort Insecure
Secure Relationships With With Need for
Confidence as Secondary Relationships Closeness Approval
n M SD M SD M SD M SD M SD

Controls 23 34.65 4.41 17.00 5.53 27.61 5.11 33.09 4.91 20.30 5.56
Victims 22 31.13 4.22 17.82 5.62 32.77 7.55 38.22 4.96 25.86 6.71
Pedophiles 25 23.76 6.10 24.60 5.87 29.12 4.76 36.24 7.85 23.32 6.12
F(2, 67) 29.49* 13.02* 4.58 4.03 4.64
p .000 .000 .014 .022 .013
a
Controls versus victims .027 .947 .033 .003* .013
a
Victims versus pedophiles .000* .001* .167 .657 .456
a
Controls versus pedophiles .000* .000* .651 .272 .221
a. Tamhane T2 test. See SPSS 7.5 (SPSS, 1998).
*p < .01, significant.

A simple factorial ANOVA was carried out with Research Group as the
dependent variable and the five subscales of the ASQ plus Duration of Relation-
ship as the independent variables. The combined main effect was highly signifi-
cant, F(12, 51) = 6.19, p < .001, and the individual scale effects were also signifi-
cant: Relationships as Secondary, F(2, 61) = 11.79, p < .001; Secure Attachment,
F(2, 61) = 13.93, p < .001; and Duration of Relationship, F(2, 61) = 7.38, p < .002;
but none of the interactions was significant. The structural model (ANOVA)
(SPSS, 1998) generated in the analysis accounted for 59.3% of the variance, and
there was a multiple correlation of .77, F(12, 51) = 6.19, p < .001, between
research group membership (control, victim, pedophile) and the longest duration
of a sexual relationship plus the ASQ subscales. There is, in summary, a signifi-
cant link between the maximum duration of a mans sexual relationships and his
attachment style as identified by the ASQ.
There were significant differences (p < .001, Tamhane T2 test) on the Confi-
dence (secure attachment) scale in relation to the duration of adult sexual relation-
ships, with significantly higher scores for those relationships lasting longer than
60 months (M = 31.5, SD = 4.6). The lowest scores were found for those individu-
als with relationships lasting less than 6 months (M = 22.3, SD = 4.9). There was
no significant difference between participants who had medium-term (6 to 60
months) relationships (M = 32.5, SD = 6.2) and those who had longer term rela-
tionships (more than 60 months).
Attachment and Pedophilia 41

There were significant differences (p < .001, Tamhane T2 test) on the Relation-
ships as Secondary scale in relation to duration of adult sexual relationships. The
highest mean score was associated with those men who had relationships lasting
less than 6 months (M = 24.7, SD = 5.3). The lowest mean score was associated
with the men who had relationships lasting more than 60 months (M = 17.0, SD =
5.9). There were no significant differences between participants who had relation-
ships of more than 60 months and those who had medium-term (6 to 60 months)
relationships. Nevertheless, the difference in the means between those who had
short-term relationships (less than 6 months) and medium-term relationships (6 to
60 months) (M = 19.7, SD = 6.7) was approaching significance for this study at the
.05 level.
Further ANOVAs were carried out on the score distributions of CAT items 42
and 43 against the Research Group, with the results shown in Table 2. The results
indicated that there was no significant difference in the number of adult sexual
relationships (Item 43) reported by the three groups, but that the pedophiles had
the shortest duration of reported adult sexual relationships (Item 42) when com-
pared with the controls and the victims, between whom there was no significant
difference. To check the validity of the ANOVAS at the item level, two chi-squares
were carried out on contingency tables of the research groups against the item
score distributions. In the case of Item 42 (duration), the chi-square = 27.40, (p <
.001, df = 4), and in the case of Item 43 (number), the chi-square = 0.19, (ns, df =
4). These results confirm the overall findings from the ANOVAS.
It would appear that there is a link between the reported maximum duration of a
mans adult sexual relationships, his attachment style as identified by the ASQ,
and his offending status; that is, pedophiles have a shorter duration of adult sexual
relationships when compared with victims or controls.

Child Abuse, Neglect, and Trauma (CAT)

On the Sexual Abuse subscale, a significant overall difference between the
groups was found. The control group scored significantly lower (i.e., reported very
much less sexual abuse) than the victim group and the pedophile group (p < .001,
see Table 3). The comparison between the pedophile group and the victim group
was not significant in terms of the reported levels of sexual abuse in childhood.
On the Neglect/Negative Home Atmosphere subscale there was an overall sig-
nificant difference between the groups. The control group scored significantly
lower (i.e., had a more positive home atmosphere) than the victim and the
pedophile groups. However, there was only a difference approaching significance
for this study (p = .046, see Table 3) between the victim and the pedophile groups.
On the Punishment subscale, there was an overall significant difference
between the groups. The pedophile group scored significantly higher than did the
control group. The difference between the control group and the victim group
approached significance for this study (p < .02, see Table3), but no significant dif-
ference was found between the victim group and the pedophile group.
42 International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology

TABLE 2
RESEARCH GROUP AND SEXUAL EXPERIENCE (MODIFIED
CHILD ABUSE AND TRAUMA SCALE, ONE-WAY ANOVA)

Sexual Experience
Duration of Longest Number of Sexual
Sexual Relationshipa Relationshipsb
n M SD M SD

Controls 23 4.60 0.50 3.74 2.22

Victims 22 4.00 1.30 3.32 1.64
Pedophiles 25 2.39 1.27 3.24 2.05
F(2, 67) 23.39* .43
p .000 .655

Controls versus victimsc .261 .853

Victims versus pedophilesc .000* .998
Controls versus pedophilesc .000* .808
a. Item 42: 1 = Never, 2 6 months, 3 = 6 months but < 1 year, 4 = 1 year but < 5 years, 5 = 5 years and
more.
b. Item 43: 1 = None, 2 = 1 to 4, 3 = 5 to 10, 4 = 11 or more sexual relationships.
c. Tamhane T2 test. See SPSS 7.5 (SPSS, 1998).
*p < .01, significant.

In terms of the level of overall (total) abuse, there was a highly significant dif-
ference between the three groups (p < .001, see Table 3). The pedophile group
reported the most abuse, but the difference between it and the victim group failed
to reach statistical significance. However, both the victim and the pedophile
groups reported significantly more childhood abuse than did the control group.
The level of Total Abuse correlated inversely with the level of secure attachment
(Confidence) (r = .51, p > .001) and positively with Relationships as Secondary
(r = .28, p < .01). These two correlations indicate that there are significant direct
relationships between the level of overall reported childhood neglect and abuse
and some aspects of adult insecure attachment.
Item 41 (How often were you sexually abused before the age of 14?) corre-
lated negatively ( = .31, p < .05, N = 70) with the duration of the longest adult
sexual relationship (Item 42). This finding suggests that the frequency of sexual
abuse does have some influence on the stability of adult sexual relationships.

DISCUSSION

The victims and the pedophiles came from similar, self-reported, abusive
backgrounds (see Table 3) but the results of this study indicated that the controls
Attachment and Pedophilia 43

TABLE 3
RESEARCH GROUP AND DEVELOPMENTAL ABUSE
(CHILD ABUSE AND TRAUMA SCALE, ONE-WAY ANOVA)

Type of Abuse
Sexual Abuse Neglect/NHA Punishment Total Abuse
n M SD M SD M SD M SD

Controls 23 0.87 2.93 26.09 12.90 10.61 4.20 37.57 16.83

Victims 22 9.68 6.28 49.18 19.91 14.68 5.15 73.55 28.15
Pedophiles 25 11.28 6.90 62.48 15.50 17.28 4.68 91.04 25.21
F(2, 67) 22.82* 30.42* 12.28* 30.98*
p .000 .000 .000 .000
a
Controls versus victims .000* .000* .018 .000*
a
Victims versus pedophiles .795 .046 .218 .090
a
Controls versus pedophiles .000* .000* .000* .000*
NOTE: NHA = negative home atmosphere.
a. Tamhane T 2 test. See SPSS 7.5 (SPSS, 1998).
*p < .01, significant.

and victims were both more securely attached than the pedophiles, who were
found to be insecurely attached on two constructs, namely, high on Relationships
as Secondary and low on Confidence (low secure attachment). The finding for the
controls and pedophiles is in line with the research of Ward et al. (1996). Cur-
rently, there are no published results relating to the quality of attachment for male
nonoffending victims of sexual abuse. The findings reported here provide some
support for the ASQ as a measure of attachment and as a clinical tool to measure
differences in attachment style.
Ward et al. (1996) have suggested that pedophiles are more likely to have a
Fearful/Preoccupied With Relationships style and rapists are likely to have a Dis-
missing/Relationships as Secondary style. In contrast, this study found that
pedophiles have a Relationships as Secondary style of attachment. Individuals
having this attachment style are likely to experience a lack of empathy, emotional
defensiveness, and an insensitivity to interpersonal cues, making the development
of interpersonal relationships difficult to establish and maintain. The interper-
sonal relations of such individuals may be further undermined by the perception
that others are responsible for their lack of intimacy, resulting in harbored feelings
of hostility. Furthermore, such individuals try to minimise the significance of
close relations, isolating themselves from potential rejection by adopting a defen-
sive style as a strategy to reduce negative emotional experiences. The conse-
quence of these characteristics is social deprivation, which undermines the likeli-
hood of developing satisfying adult intimate relationships. According to
Bartholomew (1990), individuals who exhibit the emotionally defensive posture
44 International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology

associated with the Relationships as Secondary style have been found to experi-
ence high levels of discomfort with peers of the opposite sex. This offers support
to the notion that a Relationships as Secondary style of attachment could under-
mine adult heterosexual relationships.
In this study, a Relationships as Secondary attachment style was found to
impact negatively on the capacity to maintain an adult sexual relationship, as
pedophiles reported the shortest duration of adult sexual relationships but had the
same number of reported adult sexual relationships as the other two groups (see
Table 2). The significance of this finding should be tempered by the fact that in the
pedophile group, relationships may have been interrupted by admission to prison.
Nevertheless, these findings suggest that a Relationships as Secondary style of
attachment may be a contributing factor in the development of pedophilic behav-
iour and was supported by the results of the structural model ANOVA. Individuals
with a dismissing style are vulnerable to seeking relationships lacking in inti-
macy, and the selection of children rather than adults is seen as a means of mini-
mising the need for self-disclosure and emotional involvement. These factors
should be relevant in the development of treatments for pedophiles who have a
Relationships as Secondary attachment style.
There was a consistent pattern for the victims to score higher than the controls
on Preoccupation With Relationships, Discomfort With Closeness, and Need for
Approval (see Table 1). When compared with the controls, victims experienced a
moderately higher level of Preoccupation With Relationships attachment style.
This finding is supported by Levy and Davis (1988), who found patterns of nega-
tive but weakly related correlations between secure and anxious-ambivalent
attachment. According to Feeney and Noller (1996), Preoccupation With Rela-
tionships individuals are driven by relationship insecurity and fear of abandon-
ment. They experience a strong desire for intimate relationships and anxiously
seek out others to placate their dependency needs (Bartholomew, 1990). These
desires can be thwarted because of their sensitivity to negative affect and an
inability to contain emotional expression such as anger and anxiety (Feeney,
1995). There was no significant difference between pedophiles and controls on
this construct, which may appear confounding, but this would suggest that men
can have this attachment style and not necessarily develop pedophilic behaviours.
There were similar near-significant findings on the Discomfort With Closeness
and Need for Approval subscales of the ASQ; that is, the victims showed some-
what elevated scores on both these constructs. Overall on these three insecure
attachment style subscales, this trend was significant, F(2, 67) = 6.56, p < .005.
Feeney, Noller, and Hanrahan (1994) define secure attachment as being high
on Confidence and low on all other scales (p. 143). The results of the current
study indicate that the controls and nonoffending victims scored significantly
higher on Confidence than the pedophiles. However, because victims and
pedophiles demonstrate less security of attachment when compared with con-
trols, they also experience discrete aspects of insecure attachment. The most
securely attached (controls) exhibited no significant levels of the styles associated
Attachment and Pedophilia 45

with insecure attachment and, in fact, had the lowest mean scores on each of the
insecure attachment subscales. These results support the notion that an insecure
attachment style may make a man vulnerable to developing pedophilic behav-
iours. Conversely, those men with a secure attachment style are more resilient to
participating in pedophilic behaviour, even if they have experienced neglect
and/or abuse as children.
The current findings are consistent with the suggestion (Hudson & Ward,
1997) that insecure attachment represents a vulnerability with intimate relation-
ships. It is worth considering, however, that there are likely to be individual differ-
ences between insecure styles of attachment, and these variations may not be con-
gruent with specific offending behavior. This has implications for treatment, as
attachment style may provide a better basis for understanding the psychological
processes associated with offenders and victims rather than categories of
psychopathology and criminality.
The amount of abuse a person experiences during childhood affects the emo-
tional and behavioural development of that individual (Cicchetti et al., 1995). In
this study, both pedophiles and victims experienced more sexual assault, neglect,
punishment, and negative home atmosphere than the controls but not significantly
more than each other. These findings may be underscored by the finding that both
groups experienced significant childhood victimisation, with 64% of pedophiles
and 68% of victims reporting a severely stressful childhood. In contrast, con-
trols indicated that they had not experienced childhood sexual activity with an
adult and none reported that their childhood was severely stressful.
Both victims and pedophiles reported that prior to the age of 14 they had
engaged very often in sexual activity with an adult (43% and 43%, respec-
tively). This finding may bring into question the contribution of sexual abuse as a
discrete factor in the development of pedophilic behavior (Finkelhor, 1986,
1990). Pedophiles reported more sexual abuse experiences with a relative (82%)
in comparison with victims (37%). This stranger factor is thought to mitigate
against the adverse effects of sexual abuse (Briggs & Hawkins, 1996; Finklehor,
1990). In this study, both the controls and victims were found to have secure
attachments, even though the pedophiles and the nonoffending victims had expe-
rienced similar levels of neglect and abuse.
It should be noted that this study employed retrospective self-report measures,
and these cannot accommodate defensiveness or the distortions of self that are
reported among pedophiles. The pedophile may, for example, see himself as a vic-
tim as a way of trying to cope with his pedophilic behaviours. It is also possible
that victims and pedophiles may reconstruct their early experiences differently
from those people who developed in a secure, nonstressful, and caring environ-
ment. The current results are, in this sense, all post hoc and need to be interpreted
with some caution.
According to Hazan and Zeifman (1994), sexual attraction represents the pri-
mary motivation for proximity-seeking behaviour in adults. They argue that the
endpoint of reciprocal attachment in childhood marks the beginning of the pro-
46 International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology

cess of peer-attachment formation in adults. In pedophiles this process has been

found to be interrupted because of deviant early sexual experiences and maternal
rejection (Marshall & Mazzucco, 1995). The latter factor represents the
nonsexual affective component of deviant sexual development. From this per-
spective, an adult who has not developed a secure attachment system may con-
strue early abusive sexual experiences as enticing because they represent some
form of intimacy, albeit in a culturally deviant form. This may set the occasion for
males who have not experienced secure attachment to be vulnerable to placating
intimacy needs by way of pedophilic behaviour. Men who are not securely
attached but who have associated early sexual experiences with positive intimacy
experiences may seek out a child sexual partner when interpersonal stressors such
as relationship dissolution, rejection, and separation threaten their intimacy needs
(Marshall, 1989).
Attachment theory proposes that the person who is securely attached is more
resilient to developmental stressors than the insecurely attached person (Masten &
OConnor, 1989). From this perspective, the current study has produced evidence
that secure attachment is salient to breaking the link between being abused and
progressing to sexually offending against children. The current findings provide
some explanation as to why some victims become offenders and some do not.
The samples were small and demographic information was limited, but many
of the findings were significant, with all the noted significant differences being
greater than p < .01. Given the small number of cases and the level of statistical
significance, it may be that the findings have a clinical as well as a statistical sig-
nificance. There is, however, always a potential problem with small samples, such
as the current ones, in generalizing the results. Further research, particularly lon-
gitudinal, is needed to identify the discrete factors that contribute to the develop-
ment of the attachment style of victims and pedophiles and how this relates to sex-
ual offending behavior in the adult.
Bowlby (1980) is of the opinion that the stability of attachment style may be
altered by life events that change the quality of an individuals style of dealing
with intimate relationships. Could psychological treatment be such a life event?
This study has measured current adult attachment styles and, therefore, inferences
have to be made as to the style of attachment operating prior to and/or at the time
of the reported abuse. This is a weakness in many of the studies referenced in this
article, but it is unavoidable without longitudinal studies. Nevertheless, studies of
this cross-sectional type can contribute to the understanding of the nature of
pedophilic behaviour and can provide information of value for the development of
treatment strategies.
The results suggest that attachment styles should contribute to a more
fine-grained assessment procedure in the development of treatment strategies for
a pedophile. The outcome of such an assessment should assist in the treatment of
offenders and help the offender to understand at least part of the developmental
processes involved in his offending behaviour. The current results support the
views of Kear-Colwell and Pollock (1997) that a confrontational therapeutic
Attachment and Pedophilia 47

encounter could be perceived by the insecurely attached pedophile as another

aversive experience with adult relationships and could assist in reinforcing
pedophilic feelings and behaviours. All the work that is being published in the
area on the relationship between attachment and sexual offending behaviour, for
example, that of Ward et al. (1996) and a recent article by Smallbone and Dadds
(1998), leads to the determination that a reappraisal of treatment styles and meth-
ods is needed. A conclusion that arises from the current findings is that the style of
therapy used with pedophiles needs to change from a confrontational-based
approach to one based on rapport and support, one that could positively influence
the attachment style of the offender. This change of therapeutic style would be
supported by efficacy findings with regard to psychological treatment, wherein a
confrontational style is associated with poor outcome (Horvath & Symonds, 1991;
Miller, Benefield, & Tonigan, 1993). Therapeutic approaches such as cognitive-
analytic therapy (Ryle, 1990, 1997) or schema-focused therapy (Young, 1994)
could be applied to these clients. These approaches, designed for the treatment of
difficult clients who are personality-disordered, focus initially on building rap-
port, facilitating and motivating the client, and then on an understanding of the cli-
ents developmental history and how this has influenced the life history and also
current feelings, thoughts, and behaviour. In active treatment, such motivational
approaches can sucessfully employ cognitive and behavioural techniques and
develop relapse-prevention skills (Baer, Kivlahan, & Donovan, 1999). The cur-
rent treatment techniques that display some efficacy with pedophiles could still be
employed (Marshall, 1996), but the psychological environment in which the treat-
ment occurs would be different. Treatment would occur in a supportive environ-
ment and be aimed at encouraging and reinforcing change, the client taking
charge of his own life and behavior and not being governed by his history. The
basic therapeutic position is that change is possible for seriously damaged indi-
viduals (Ryle, 1995), including those who commit sexual offences against chil-
dren. If the research on pedophiles having insecure attachment styles is accurate,
then to improve efficacy it becomes necessary to rethink the therapeutic style of
the treatment offered to these damaged individuals.

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Gary A. Sawle, MPsych

Member of the Australian Psychological Society
Clinical Psychologist
Wentworth Area Health Service
New South Wales
Australia

Jon Kear-Colwell, Ph.D.

Fellow of the British Psychological Society
Consultant Clinical Psychologist
Senior Lecturer in Forensic Psychology
School of Social Sciences and Liberal Sciences
Charles Sturt University
NSW 2795
Australia