Dealing with CSA at the point of Disclosure

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Strategies for dealing with Child Sexual Assault at the point of Disclosure: A Personal and Agency Perspective

By Kay Churchill and Karen Cameron*

This article is reproduced with the kind permission of the author and the publisher. It appeared in Australian Social Work. September, 1987, Vol. 40. This work is copyright and may not be reproduced in any way without the written permission of the publisher/author.
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*The authors worked together as social workers at The Westmead Sexual Assault Centre, Westmead Hospital, for a number of years. At the time of writing, Kay is Coordinator of the Child Sexual Assault Programme at the Roy McCaughey Barnardo Centre, Auburn. New South Wales and Karen is involved in Adult Education in welfare.

The disclosure of sexual assault is a potentially traumatic event for the child and her or his caregivers. Workers often find it difficult to intervene appropriately at this point. This paper provides a method for case planning and highlights appropriate interventions based on the experience of counsellors at Westmead Sexual Assault Centre, Sydney.

Introduction

Over the last three to four years in New South Wales there has been a rapid rise in the number of child sexual assault cases brought to the attention of the authorities. Various agencies concerned with child protection are spending a greater amount of time working with victims and their caregivers at the point of crisis. However, any intervention is also potentially traumatic. In some ways the crisis of disclosure has parallels with the crisis of sexual assault in that there can be confusion, guilt and feelings of powerlessness over the proceedings. One frequently stated concern on the part of the child is over the anticipated reactions of those who receive the disclosure. Consequently, the behaviour and responses of those who work with the child and caregivers are of paramount importance.

This can also be a daunting time for the worker involved, and the process may become draining and confusing. Sometimes it appears that both worker and family lose direction. When there is such a loss of direction, or a family appears to withdraw cooperation, it may be that the worker has faded to accurately pinpoint and deal with the family's primary concerns.

The aim of this paper is to provide a model for understanding the crisis of assault and disclosure from the point of view of victims and caregivers. It will assist the worker to identify salient issues for each victim and caregiver.

Our model considers two categories of information which must be taken into account: the first concerns factors related to the child and caregiver's situation; the second is the range of issues that are common to children and caregivers presenting after the disclosure of sexual assault. These two categories will be delineated in the first section of this paper.

The data elicited from these two categories will allow the worker to hypothesise, or predict, which issues are most important and relevant to each child and caregiver. These hypotheses may then be tested out in the interview situation. This process is represented in Figure 1.

While the focus of this model is on identifying which issues are most important to the child and caregiver. The worker must also take great care with the conduct of the interview situation. The second section of this paper will provide some practical methods of facilitating any interventions, including the formal interview.

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