The number of people being arrested for online sexual offences is rising exponentially. Many of these sex offences relate to children. Why are we suddenly seeing such a rise in the number of these offences? The internet has a huge role to play. Whilst the motivating pathways to offending are complex, addiction is a major component.
Models have traditionally defined the basis of addiction purely in neurobiological terms. When a person injects heroin the drug will bind to the opioid receptors in the reward centre of the brain. A rush of dopamine will make the user feel euphoric and pain will be eliminated. Any worries that the person had will suddenly be washed away temporarily.
Repeated heroin uses changes the physical structure of the brain, creating long-term neuronal and hormonal imbalances. Changes in the white matter of the brain, lead to a deterioration in decision-making and a reduced ability to regulate one’s emotions. Tolerance leads to a need to increase the dosage to achieve the same dopamine hit. If the drug is removed, withdrawal symptoms occur as the body attempts to compensate for the removal.
Many people who view pornography are not addicts. They access the material at certain times but are not addicted to it. Other people become addicted to pornography and when they don’t view it, they go into ‘withdrawal’ (shaking, insomnia, anxiety etc). The white matter in their brain has been altered and decision-making affected.
Pornography has become more graphic and violent over the years and this has fed into the addiction cycle for many people. Traditional ‘soft’ porn is difficult to access on mainstream porn sites and more extreme ‘gonzo’ porn is prolific. The ‘user’ has been gradually conditioned to accept this material. Tolerance of the material is occurring. The user finds that in order to achieve that same dopamine rush as before, they now need to access material they once found disgusting.
The increasingly extreme material on mainstream porn sites is one of the factors feeding into the pathway for online sexual offending. People are being influenced by the content and the lines between fantasy and reality are being blurred. There has been an increase in the number of sex offences of a violent nature among lovers, especially among young people. As the addiction grows, the person seeks more dangerous material including illegal material. The realms of sexual fantasy are being pushed into darker and darker areas including child sex abuse material.
The internal inhibitors that normally stop a person from engaging in looking at indecent pictures of children have been altered. In the depths of addiction, the inner restraints that normally stop a person from ‘going there’ are faulty and impulsivity occurs. Cognitive function in the white matter of the brain is affected and can be clearly seen on an MRI. For a more scientific in-depth view, read this peer reviewed article “Cognitive Inhibition” by Brooks & Stein (2016).
Modern definitions of addiction have been widened to include socio-emotional aspects. No longer can addiction be simply defined by chemical reactions. For example, many people given diamorphine (heroin) in hospital for the pain associated with injuries, operations or diseases, don’t all become drug-addicts when they leave hospital. Factors contributing to a person’s social and emotional well-being interplay with addiction potentiality.
In a well-known 1970’s experiment called ‘Rat Park‘, rats who had access to friends and fun activities were significantly less likely to drink heroin-laced water, compared to those rats left alone in their cage. This exemplifies that rats were far less likely to succumb to addiction if they had a well-balanced life. This is fascinating because it shows that social animals can be redirected to more constructive rewarding activities instead of resorting to addictive drug-taking. It just takes a little bit of effort to set up the right facilities.
The ‘Good Lives’ Model website (GLM) is a fantastic resource for helping people identify areas of their lives that may need ‘enriching’. The theory that if a person is fulfilled in all areas of their life, then they will be less likely to commit offences. The model was initially designed to help adolescents engaged in criminal activities. Tony Ward (founder), PhD, MA (Hons), DipClinPsyc, is currently professor in clinical psychology at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, hosts the following website http://goodlivesmodel.com/
The GLM has now been extended to include a large number of programmes including the rehabilitation of sex offenders and drug addicts.
The GLM offers a comprehensive, targeted and individually meaningful framework for rehabilitative work with offenders. It should be noted that the GLM is ultimately a framework for healthy human functioning and as such, should be considered as a necessary approach for therapeutic work with any offender or client base. If we are truly serious about not seeing offenders return to the criminal justice system time after time, then we must be holistic in our treatment and case management approach and be committed to equipping offenders to live better, pro-social and personally meaningful lives
http://goodlivesmodel.com
Research is showing that one of the major components leading to online child sex offences is porn and masturbation addiction. It is disturbing to know that someone who initially found child sex abuse material disturbing, can then later begin to seek it out. That is the nature of addiction. When it comes to porn addiction, tolerance is dangerous and has led to the destruction of lives. However, because addiction can be relatively easy to treat, society can begin to tackle this problem.
We can educate our children about the dangers of porn addiction and how it can spiral into something illegal and destructive. We can campaign the government to have the removal of indecent images of children removed from mainstream porn sites. We can rehabilitate those people who have been prosecuted with programmes to enhance well-being such as The Good Lives Model. Society can begin to address this hidden taboo and then we will see things get better for everyone.