Child Sex Trafficking Research

Society often overlook other “less” prevalent crimes, one prime example is child sex prostitution. There are not a lot research concerning this particular type of crime, in addition to a small amount of ample evidence supporting the level of severity, and coming up with prevention policy (Reid, 2012). There is a growing trend for this type of service, around the world and United States (Fong & Cardoso, 2010). Although, most sex trafficking cases are often more associated with adults, it is actually the youth and/or child populations that are increasing in the number of sexual exploitation cases (Fong & Cardoso, 2010). The following contents will take a brief look at child sex trafficking in terms of age range, destructive outcome; also providing

an explanation on different causes and effects regarding the circumstances or modes that encourage young populations into sexual trafficking. It will also touch up on prevention methods, research and studies in respect to the topic.
Awareness of child sexual trafficking can be viewed as a balanced scale, with one side representing the country’s population that is fully informed of the issue, while the other side is either unaware or unattached to the issue. The public needs to have more involvement with the affair based on multiple concerns; first, the act of child sex trafficking itself is a serious crime that violates human rights (Fong & Cardoso, 2010). Second, various health adverse effects including sexually transmitted diseases, physical damages, mental disturbance, post traumatic stress disorders, and other illnesses also plague many victims (Fong & Cardoso, 2010). Third, generating poverty as a result of obstructing economic, and social development (Reid, 2012). Sex trafficking is a worldwide dilemma affecting numerous countries in multifolds of complexities; furthermore, according to the article “Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking in the United Sates”, there is a greater amount of sex trafficked victims in America compared to foreign countries, especially with the youth population (Kotrla, 2010). Child sex trafficking is considered to be a serious form of sex trafficking, the definition given by the United States Congress is “sex trafficking in which a commercial sex is induced by force, fraud, or coercion, or in which a person induced to perform such an act has not attained 18 years of age” (Reid, 2012; TVPA, 2000). The primary difference that help categorize between adult sex trafficking and child sex trafficking is the age range, one might say a sixteen-year-old is not considered to be a child. However, the Rights of the Child explains “every human being below the age of 18, unless under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier” (Gozdziak, 2008). The article written by Elzbieta M. Gozdziak “On Challenges, Dilemmas, and Opportunities in Studying Trafficked Children” states that the definition provided above meant that there would not be any difference or distinction between a teenager who is fourteen compare to a four-year-old child (Gozdziak, 2008). The main concentration of sex trafficking victims falls in between the fourteen and seventeen years of age (Gozdziak, 2008, p. 904), there are younger kids, just not as prevalent.
A child can be dragged into sex trafficking in numerous different ways, either through isolation, exchange for drugs addictions, or financial instability, etc. (Reid & Piquero, 2014). There are some common terminologies regarding the determinants that led many young victims into this path; the first one is “love bombing”, this term is coined by many gang members, which infers promises made to young victims for love or better lives, then requiring them to earn money through sex trafficking (Reid, 2014). The second term is “entrapment”, this general term regards to schemes that a pimp or exploiter can use to influence emotions in order to force victims in to perform sexual trafficking (Reid, 2014). A few familiar examples can be: normalizing sex, isolation, flatter or romance, preying on intellectually disabled youths (Reid, 2014), false agencies advertise for modeling opportunity, but often turns out to be traps for abduction leading to sex trafficking (Hodge, 2008). The entrapment examples above vary in repetition, some are used often, while others are special cases (Reid, 2014). Another term is “enmeshment”, this term offers an alternative conception for emotional factors behind the reasons why a child victim is stuck in sex trafficking situation; for examples, loyalty, a sense of obligation, pimps provide hope to return to family, intimidations, fear of harming loved ones (Reid, 2014). It is also highly conventional to threaten pregnant female victims, ranging from threats of putting the baby up for adoption, or forcing abortion can be a big motivation for most girls to remain trafficking (Reid, 2014). Cases relating to entrapment, and/or enmeshment are common, at the same time, there are other causative factors that should define how problematic today society is, consequently contribute to predicament like child sex trafficking.
There are multiple tipping points happen in daily, ordinary life that can augment the likelihood of a child spiral into dangerous situations, and then turn to sex trafficking as a solution.

In the article “Characteristics of child commercial sexual exploitation and sex trafficking victims presenting for medical care in the United States”, a study was conducted regarding a group of sex trafficking victims, the result shows history of abuse prior to exploitation with a high majority of victims can attest for (Varma & Gillespie & McCracken & Greenbaum, 2015). Also on the list are parental substance abuse, and runaway behavior; runaway or homeless youths often offer sex in exchange for food or money, one form of sexual trafficking (Varma & Gillespie & McCracken & Greenbaum, 2015). Sexual orientation, history of suicide attempts, being African American (race bias), lack of resources and/or unemployment (Reid & Piquero, 2014) are other causative agents that raise the susceptibility of rendering to sex trafficking (Varma & Gillespie & McCracken & Greenbaum, 2015). Some of these factors often link together or represent a chain reaction based on the examples listed above. Sexual trafficking for the youth population could have resulted from one of the examples mentioned above, from one problems after another, or multiple problems in one setting; casing point, a young child can be raise in a setting where his or her parents abuse substances, while facing personal problem as well, these exigencies could force a child seeking other forms of comfort or solutions. Often, a child sex trafficking victim is at a higher risk for making poor decision, both prior and subsequent to exploitation, due to the effect of the brain development-impulsivity or lack of experience (Varma & Gillespie & McCracken & Greenbaum, 2015). Another big factor contributing to the spread of child sexual trafficking would be the Internet, it is a risky environment for many young children (Kotrla, 2010). With

the fast development in technologies and social media, which allows traffickers to prey on young victims online without consent of legal guardians (Kotrla, 2010).
Sexual exploitation often takes significant tolls on victims, they are moved around regularly or forced to work at multiple locations, demanding hours, and have little control to what type of service they need to provide, for example, aggressive sexual acts or being urinated on (Hodge, 2008). Victims shows physical damages to bones, teeth, head, and psychological damages in self esteem, PTSD, panic attacks (Hodge, 2008). Another study was conducted to record information about physical and emotional effects due to sex trafficking, the findings showed that many victims seek medical care, damages varies from having STI, depression, weight loss, substance abuse, suicide attempts, chronic diseases (Varma & Gillespie & McCracken & Greenbaum, 2015). There have been several attempts to reduce the rates of child sexual trafficking, and offering treatments for victims, this includes the passing of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (Reid, 2012), and the William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act which authorizes funding for services for the victims, in addition, numerous shelters are available to provide housing for victims (Kotrla, 2010). Suggestion for increasing penalty for traffickers would help reduce the rate, based on research, the punishment for selling drugs is higher than selling or trafficking humans (Hodge, 2008) Although actions were taken and administered, there is not a lot of focus revolves around child sex trafficking, little research efforts went into child sex trafficking regarding males due to restricted and limited finding based on different regions in the United States (Reid, 2012). Other concerns in regards to victims refusing to cooperate with authorities due to fears of harming their family or themselves, cooperation between traffickers and corrupted officials (Hodge, 2008), wrong treatment models used on the target groups, and most victims would prefer little attention when it comes to group treatment because of death threats from traffickers (Fong & Cardoso, 2010); these aspects would raise difficulty levels in providing services for sex trafficked victims (Hodge, 2010). As to government funding, policy and laws, respectively, not all categories of victims receive proper services, for instance, victims of maltreatment and neglect were more likely to receive service compare to sexually abused victims (Fong & Cardoso, 2010), there has been insufficient law reinforcement against traffickers (Hodge, 2008), not to mention social culture often glamorize prostitution through songs and videos, which are highly appealing to young children (Kotrla, 2010).
Ultimately, child sex trafficking proves to be a major problem in United States, not only due to the severity of the prevalence, small amount of research that often lead to minimal intervention and treatment for rescued victims. The primary point is how easy child sex trafficking can happen; starting from regular setting at home, ranging from sexual and/or drugs abuse, sexual identity, access to social media, to abduction or traffickers getting close enough to persuade victims. There needs to be more awareness among society, this would lead to more funding for research, prevention, and better treatment regarding job opportunities, support groups, mental and physical healthcare. Nevertheless, the trend of child sex trafficking is growing faster than research and prevention can keep up, this also has to do with cooperation from the victims, and how hard it is to conduct a study on child sex trafficking. Child sex trafficking remains a problem for modern society.