Questions included in measures that purport to test the knowledge of CSA prevention in children often employ vague phraseology that is open to misinterpretation. As such, how can these measures be relied upon to accurately assess children's knowledge of CSA prevention?

Here are 4 examples of questions with vague phraseology:

1) "You always have to keep secrets". The child participant is being asked to write down TRUE or FALSE.

Of course, from the perspective of the CSA prevention researcher, there is nothing vague at all about the wording of this question. After all, one of the most basic rules of CSA prevention programs is that NOT all secrets should be kept! Some secrets are good/safe/ok and some secrets are unsafe/bad/no-ok.

So, from the researcher's point of view, if the child answers TRUE, that indicates a lack of CSA prevention knowledge.

But is that really accurate?

Let's try to think about this for a moment from the child's perspective.

Of course, if the child who gave the answer has participated in a CSAPP (=child sexual abuse prevention program) that explicitly talks about different types of secrets and how some secrets are ok and can be kept, whereas others are not safe and should never be kept (which, to the best of my knowledge, basically all CSAPP's do), and that child nevertheless responds TRUE to the above questions, then, yes, it certainly makes sense to say that we have measured that the child did not gain in his knowledge (in this regard) from participating in the CSAPP.

But what if we're talking about a child who has never yet participated in a CSAPP? CSAPP outcome measures are to a great extent based on measuring children's knowledge pre-exposure to the CSAPP and contrasting that score with the score he gets post-exposure to the CSAPP. Ok, so we're talking about a child who has never yet been exposed to a CSAPP, and we're trying to figure out what, if any, CSA prevention knowledge he is lacking. And lo and behold, the child answers TRUE to the above question! There you have it, he is lacking in CSA prevention knowledge! And if post-exposure to the CSAPP he correctly answers FALSE to the above question, then we have proved that the CSAPP is effective in increasing CSA prevention knowledge. Right?

Wrong. At least, in my opinion. Allow me to explain.

The child has never been exposed to a CSAPP. So now we have to try to get into this child's head and figure out what he is probably thinking when he reads the words "secrets" (remember, the wording of the question is, "You always have to keep secrets"). Is it going to cross his mind that the question is inclusive of the following scenario: Friendly man (known to the child) reaches his hand into child's pants and molests child. Man says to child, "Let's keep this our little secret, ok?" So I ask you, is it going to occur to the child - who has never yet participated in a CSAPP - that the question is referring even to such a scenario? Probably not. So what type of scenario is going to occur to the child when he reads the question, "You always have to keep secrets"? In all likelihood, the child is NOT going to interpret the question in the manner that the researcher intended, and the only thing that is going to occur to the child is that the question is talking about innocent secrets that friends share with each other. So, if the chid answers TRUE, is that an indication that he is lacking in CSA prevention knowledge? Not at all!

The very same child who "incorrectly" answered TRUE, would in all likelihood have correctly answered FALSE had the question been worded clearly and specifically. Had the question asked, "You always have to keep secrets, even if it's a secret about how someone touched your private parts", it is very possible that the child would have correctly answered FALSE.

2) "You have to let grown-ups touch you whether you like it or not". Based on the extensive explanation above, it is not hard to imagine that a child who has never been exposed to a CSAPP might not conjure up in his mind the possibility that the question is inclusive of abusive touch. He might be thinking of things like his dad pulling him by the arm (in a non-abusive manner) to bring him to bed despite the child not wanting to go to bed, his mom wiping the ketchup stain off his cheek despite him wanting to immediately go out to play, or the doctor performing an appropriate examination despite the fact that he really would prefer to go without it. So, if the child "incorrectly" answers TRUE because these types of scenarios are the only ones coming up in his mind when he reads the question, does that indicate lack of CSA prevention knowledge? Had the question been worded clearly and specifically, perhaps the result would have been different. For example, if the question would have been worded, "You have to let grown-ups touch you whenever and however they please, even if its your private parts that they want to touch", isn't it possible that the very same child would have correctly answered FALSE?

3) "If a friend's dad asks you to help him find their lost cat, you should go right away with him and help." If a child "incorrectly" answers TRUE, is that an indication of lack of CSA prevention knowledge? How can you assume that the child realizes that the question means "without asking your responsible adult" since the question did not specify that? For all you know, the child may be interpreting the question to be referring to the value of being willing to forgo personal comfort for the sake of helping others? Perhaps the child thinks that the question is just testing to see how much he cares about the value of loving-kindness and helping others, and he is completely unaware that the question is trying to test if he knows that you first have to ask your parent (or other responsible adult) before going anywhere? Isn't it possible that, had the question been worded "If a friend's dad asks you to help him find their lost cat, you should go right away with him and help, and don't take the time to ask your parents permission if you can go", the same child would have correctly answered FALSE?

4) "Someone you know, even a relative, might want to touch your private parts in a way that feels confusing." A child who has never yet been exposed to a CSAPP would almost certainly respond to such a question with a, "What in the world are you talking about?! Hey, buddy, you've got the wrong kid! No-one in my family is messed up and I don't know any messed up people!" So the child would "incorrectly" answer FALSE. But what if the question had been worded to say, "It's not ok for someone to touch your private parts just because you know them or they are your relative", what are the chances that that very same child would not correctly answer FALSE?

The upshot of these challenges to CSA prevention knowledge measures is that they seem to deliberately employ vaguely-worded questions that employ phraseology that only post-exposure-to-CSAPP's children would be familiar with, instead of employing clearcut, specific wording that would make it clear to any child exactly what the question is getting at, and by employing the vague type of phraseology instead of explicit wording, aren't such measures inevitably going to produce unreliable results?