Measurement of women's child sexual abuse experiences: An empirical demonstration of the impact of choice of measure on estimates of incidence rates and of relationships with pathology

Interpretation and comparison of studies on child sexual abuse (CSA) in women are difficult because of the wide variations in definitions of this phenomenon represented by the measures used. We used data from a sample of 2,003 women to demonstrate the implications of the use of different measures of CSA on reports of incidence rates and the relation between CSA and depression. We used dichotomous measures, measures that take severity of sexual abuse experience into account, and measures that included or excluded similar-aged peers as possible perpetrators of CSA. The choice of measure of CSA resulted in up to a 300% difference in incidence rates within this sample. Similarly, measures differed in the strength of their relationships to depression.