What do Americans Think of Sexual Offenders?

Essay by ppp21487University, Bachelor'sB+, November 2014

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Pamela Poma SOC 485A Professor DeCrescenzo October 28, 2014 How Do Americans View Sexual Offenders? In this paper, I will discuss a variety of points and arguments from several articles regarding my topic. Throughout this semester, I researched various articles that led me to find new information, statistics and contradicting facts that raised many questions when it comes to sexual offenders. It is important for society to learn about the history of sexual offenders, and become aware about policies and legislations that were created in order to minimize the danger they impose in our neighborhoods, schools, and community. In this first article, "Do Low-risk Sexual Offenders Need Treatment?" by Helen C. Wakeling, Ruth E. Mann and Adam J. Carter, an alarming question is raised. In this article, the concern if whether low-risk sexual offenders should be treated is asked. The articles discusses that the intensity of the treatment should be proportional to the offender's risk.

This article offers an overview of evidence base for the risk principle with sexual offenders, as well as classifying other arguments in order to determine if low-risk sexual offenders should receive treatment anyway. In this article, the authors make a claim that if needed, low-risk sexual offenders should receive no more than 100 hours of offense-focused treatment and rehabilitation. In this article, a meta-analysis of over 200 studies is examined and their findings are alarming. In this study, high-risk offenders resulted in an 11% reduction in recidivism, but only a 3% reduction in low-risk offenders. Therefore, low-risk sexual offenders should receive minimal treatment. Rehabilitation for sexual offenders should be offered to those who show signs of sexual preoccupation, hostile beliefs, abuse-supportive attitudes and impulsivity. The authors of this study argued that treatment for low-risk sexual offenders should strictly be focused upon the strongly supported risk...