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Gender Differences in the Associations Among Sexual Abuse, Posttraumatic Stress Symptoms, and Delinquent Behaviors in a Sample of Detained Adolescents

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Abstract

Sexual abuse (SA) is highly prevalent among detained youth and is associated with a number of deleterious outcomes associated with self-regulation deficits; however, less is known about the consequences of SA for boys. Thus, the current study examined posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) and associated symptoms in a sample of detained youth (612 boys, 214 girls). 9.2 % of boys and 51.0 % of girls endorsed SA. There were no gender differences in rates of symptoms endorsed by sexually abused girls and boys; however, sexually abused boys reported higher rates of symptoms in comparison to non-sexually abused boys. Results indicated that, for boys only, there were significant indirect effects of emotion dysregulation (ED), borderline personality features (BP), and dissociation on the association between SA and PTSS. Additionally, there was a significant, indirect effect of BP on the association between SA and delinquent behaviors for both boys and girls.

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Correspondence to Shannon D. Chaplo.

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All procedures followed were in accordance with the ethical standards of the responsible committee on human experimentation (institutional and national) and with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975, as revised in 2000. Informed consent was obtained from all patients for being included in the study.

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All authors declare that they have no competing interests.

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This work was funded in part by a grant from the National Institute of Justice (2014-R2-CX-0020) to the second author. The third author is currently funded by the National Graduate Research Fellowship Program (No. 1256065).

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Chaplo, S.D., Kerig, P.K., Modrowski, C.A. et al. Gender Differences in the Associations Among Sexual Abuse, Posttraumatic Stress Symptoms, and Delinquent Behaviors in a Sample of Detained Adolescents. Journ Child Adol Trauma 10, 29–39 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40653-016-0122-z

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