Capacity, confidence and training of Canadian educators and school staff to recognize and respond to sexual abuse and internet exploitation of their students

Abstract

Background: Sexual exploitation of children online is an issue of growing public concern. This form of exploitation typically involves adults using the internet to communicate with children for sexual purposes or to distribute sexually explicit material involving children. To date, there is no research on the knowledge and skills of educators to recognize online sexual exploitation. This research is urgently needed since educators are well-positioned to detect, identify and report sexual exploitation of their students.

Objective: The study was conducted to understand the confidence and capacity of grade school educators to recognize and respond to online child sexual exploitation.

Participants and setting: This cross-sectional study surveyed 450 educators in Alberta, Canada between April and December 2018.

Methods: Vignettes were used to obtain experiences and attitudes surrounding four categories of exploitation or abuse: grooming, luring, sexual abuse, and sexual abuse imagery (also known as child pornography).

Results: Among school district staff, 28 % reported working with a student affected by sexual abuse in the last year, as compared to 25 % for grooming, 17 % for luring and 14 % for sexual abuse imagery. A minority of respondents expressed confidence in their ability to recognize if the internet was being employed for grooming (35 % of staff), luring (46 %) or sexual abuse (45 %) of their students.

Conclusions: Educators encounter issues of online sexual exploitation of their students almost as often as contact sexual abuse. Child protection efforts in schools should be modernized to incorporate training in online safety of children and adolescents.

Keywords: Child grooming; Child luring; Child pornography; Child sexual abuse imagery; Child sexual abuse materials; Sexual abuse.