Unveiling the predictors of intrafamilial child sexual abuse: The role of empathy, victim empathy, and cognitive distortions

Intrafamilial child sexual abuse (CSA) is a serious social and health issue. Traditional explanations focusing on antisocial tendencies and atypical sexual interests are insufficient to fully understand this crime. This study compared individuals who committed intrafamilial and extrafamilial CSA in Portugal to identify risk factors influencing offenses against related versus unrelated children. One hundred ten participants, 51 of whom had perpetrated intrafamilial CSA, completed empathy, sexual attitude, and social desirability scales. Cognitive empathy, misattributions of pleasure, and sexual drive/preoccupation emerged as predictors of intrafamilial CSA. Lower cognitive empathy and less misattributed pleasure were associated with a higher likelihood of intrafamilial abuse, whereas greater sexual drive/preoccupation was linked to a decreased probability of such offences. Findings inform CSA prevention and intervention.
The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This work was funded by Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT), under HEI- Lab R&D Unit (UID/05380/2025, UIDP/05380/2020, and UID/PRR/05380/2025; https://doi.org/10.54499/UIDB/05380/2020, https://doi.org/10.54499/UIDP/05380/2020, and https://doi.org/10.54499/UID/PRR/05380/2025 https://doi.org/10.54499/UIDB/05380/2020). This work was also conducted at CIPsi, School of Psychology, University of Minho, supported by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT; UID/01662/2020) through the Portuguese. This work is funded with national funds from FCT—Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia, I.P., in the context of the R&D Unit: UID/04810/2025 — William James Center for Research.