Preventing Peer-on-Peer Abuse

Peer-on-peer abuse is a tough topic. Children who have been sexually abused often repeat the behavior they have seen or experienced. Children molested at a young age may be more likely to molest other children at a young age and tend to have more victims.¹

Provide training for your faculty and staff about the risk of peer-on-peer abuse. It’s during transitional times—trips to the bathroom, lunch, recess—that students are more vulnerable to abuse by peers. Train your staff to be especially vigilant during these times.

There are several factors to take into account in order to mitigate the risk of peer-on-peer abuse, one of which is to minimize situations that may create imbalanced power dynamics. For example, students should be grouped by similar age and capacity for activities. When activities require mixed-age groups or genders, there should be additional supervision. These activities also should be structured and limited in duration and frequency.  Finally, you’ll want to make sure activities are held in places that are visible at all times.

1 Abel, Gene G., M.D., and Harlow, Nora. ”The Abel and Harlow Child Molestation Prevention Study.” Excerpt from The Stop Child Molestation Book, Xlibris, 2001.