child abuse in the philippines essay

An official website of the United States government

The .gov means it’s official. Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

The site is secure. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

• Publications
• Account settings

Preview improvements coming to the PMC website in October 2024. Learn More or Try it out now .

• Advanced Search
• Journal List
• J Child Adolesc Trauma
• v.14(2); 2021 Jun

Filipino Children and Adolescents’ Stories of Sexual Abuse: Narrative Types and Consequences

Nora maria elena t. osmeña.

1 Psychology Department, Negros Oriental State University, Dumaguete City, Philippines

Dan Jerome S. Barrera

2 College of Criminal Justice Education, Negros Oriental State University, Dumaguete City, Philippines

There is a paucity of qualitative research on children’s and adolescents’ perceptions of their sexual abuse experiences. This paper aims to describe the narrative types and consequences of sexual abuse stories among ten female Filipino children and adolescents. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews and analyzed using dialogical narrative analysis. Results show that three narrative types appear in the stories of the survivors. These are the tragic resistance narrative, rescued slave narrative, and heroic saga narrative, and each of these narratives has idiosyncratic effects on the identities, affiliations, disclosure, and adjustment processes of the participants. The results show how symbolic cultural structures can have far-reaching consequences on sexually abused children and adolescents.

Introduction

Sexual abuse in childhood and adolescence remains a prevalent social problem. A worldwide estimate shows that 13% of girls and 6% of boys experience sexual abuse in childhood and adolescence (Barth et al. 2013 ). As a result, they experience debilitating adverse mental, psychological, physical, and health effects (Amado et al. 2015 ; Hillberg et al. 2011 ; Maniglio 2009 ; Norman et al. 2012 ; Teicher and Samson 2016 ). In the Philippines, a national survey shows that the lifetime prevalence of child and youth sexual abuse is 21.5% - 24.7% for boys and 18.2% for girls (CWC and UNICEF 2016 ). These reported abuses are a bit higher than some worldwide estimates, and they even lead to early smoking, sex, and pregnancy, having multiple partners, substance use, and suicide among the victims (Ramiro et al. 2010 ). Despite this information, research on children’s and adolescents’ narratives on sexual abuse in the Philippines gathered through qualitative approaches t is limited (Roche 2017 ). This gap is not surprising because systematic reviews show that only a handful of extant studies have analyzed children’s and adolescents’ perceptions of their sexual abuse experiences (Morrison et al. 2018 ; Watkins-Kagebein et al. 2019 ). The bulk of the literature on children and adolescents’ sexual abuse experiences comes from retrospective accounts of adult survivors (Alaggia et al. 2019 ; Tener and Murphy 2015 ), which may differ from children’s and adolescents’ themselves due to recall bias, participants’ advanced developmental phase, and other factors (Foster and Hagedorn 2014 ; Morrison et al. 2018 ; Watkins-Kagebein et al. 2019 ).

Nevertheless, there has been a recent surge of interest in studying young victims’/survivors’ sexual abuse accounts. These studies documented the emotional experiences of children and adolescents, including their fear, anger, pain, worry, and coping strategies (Foster and Hagedorn 2014 ; McElvaney et al. 2014 ; San Diego 2011 ; Schönbucher et al. 2012 ); the disclosure processes and their barriers and facilitators (Foster and Hagedorn 2014 ; Jackson et al. 2015 ; Jensen et al. 2005 ; McElvaney et al. 2014 ; Schaeffer et al. 2011 ; Schönbucher et al. 2012 ); and the subjects’ healing journey through therapeutic processes (Capella et al. 2016 ; Foster and Hagedorn 2014 ; San Diego 2011 ). Besides the emotional aspects, secondary victimization in the justice system (Foster and Hagedorn 2014 ; Capella et al. 2016 ) also manifested in the reports.

However, what remains underexplored in these studies and adult retrospections are the meso-level factors that affect post-sexual abuse emotions, reactions (e.g., disclosures), coping and adjustment, and identity work. One example at the meso-level is culture (Sanjeevi et al. 2018 ). In their review, Sanjeevi et al. ( 2018 , p. 631) note that studying culture is essential to “provide culturally competent and culturally valid services” to children and adolescents who have experienced sexual abuse. However, this inquiry line is underdeveloped as most culturally-oriented studies have either studied culture as practices (e.g., ways of raising a child, sleeping arrangements, child marriage) or beliefs (e.g., beliefs on what constitutes sexual abuse). A treatment of culture as a system of symbols is absent in child sexual abuse literature, especially in studies of children and adolescents’ accounts of their sexual abuse experiences. In this study, we treat culture as “a structure of symbolic sets” that “provide[s] a nonmaterial structure” of actions by “creating patterned order, lines of consistency in human actions” (Alexander and Smith 1993 , p. 156). Furthermore, a narrative is an example of a symbol. Narratives are culturally available resources and structures (e.g., tragedy, romance, comedy) with which people construct their personal stories (Frank 2010 ). Furthermore, narrative analysis makes these narrative types visible (Wong and Breheny 2018 ).

The narrative approach has not been extensively used in sexual abuse studies. Although few studies employ this methodology (e.g., Capella et al. 2016 ; Foster and Hagedorn 2014 ; Harvey et al. 2000 ; Hunter 2010 ), these studies were more thematic. They focused more on the ‘what”s’ of storytelling and neglected the ‘how’s’ (Gubrium and Holstein 2009 ). Thus, there is a need for other narrative approaches like dialogical and structural (Riessman 2008 ). We argue that Arthur Frank’s ( 2010 , 2012 ) socio-narratology and dialogical narrative analysis can fill this void.

Socio-narratology views stories not just as retrospective devices of representing the past but also prospective ones that interpellate people to assume identities, affiliate/disaffiliate from others and do things (Frank 2010 , 2012 ). As Alameddine ( 2009 : 450) notes: “Events matter little, only stories of those events affect us.” This view tends to find support in some narrative psychologists’ (e.g., Bruner 1987 ; Polkinghorne 1988 ) and philosophers’ (Carr 1986 ; MacIntyre 1981 ; Ricoeur 1984 ) stand on the power of stories in people’s lives. As Polkinghorne ( 1988 , p. 145) posited, life/action is the “living narrative expression of a personal and social life. The competence to understand a series of episodes as part of our story informs our own decisions to engage in actions that move us toward a desired ending.” Polkinghorne added that stories and narratives provide us with models for the self, action, and life, and we use these models to plan our actions and assume identities.

This paper aims to describe the narrative types and consequences of sexual abuse stories among ten female Filipino children and adolescents. We argue that cultural symbols in the form of narratives describe phenomena through personal stories, and they also tend to influence emotions and actions. This perspective, we believe, is also applicable to children’s and adolescents’ stories and experiences of sexual abuse. Narrative types can be visible from these stories of sexual abuse, which have material effects on disclosure processes, emotions, coping, identity work, and behavioral and social adjustment of children and adolescents who have had the experience.

Methodology

The researchers sought to capture data by profiling the Filipino children’s and adolescents’ lives before, during, and after experiencing sexual abuse through semi-structured interviews. The participants were contacted and recruited through a temporary government-controlled crisis center in the province of Negros Oriental, Philippines, where they were housed. Of the twelve participant interviews, only ten were analyzed because two participants did not answer some questions critical to the analysis.

Table ​ Table1 1 shows the socio-demographic characteristics of the participants. As shown, most of the participants were sexually abused in their adolescence (10–19) by family members with whom they lived at the time of the abuse. At the time of the interview, all of them had studied for at least 3 years when the abuse started.

Socio-demographic charateristics of the participants

Data Gathering Procedures

After having been granted the ethics board approval, consent from the government agency that controlled the center, the caregivers, and the participants was obtained. Contacts with the target participants were developed through the said government agency, which had personal information in the center. The target participants were then informed about the nature of the study and its purpose and were also asked about their willingness to participate. They were briefed on the confidentiality of the information gathered from them and the anonymity of their identity. Those who opted to participate were requested to sign informed consent forms and to indicate their preferred schedule and place of interview, which could be any place conducive.

The study utilized face-to-face semi-structured interviews, which were conducted by the lead author and employing narrative interviewing techniques (Jovchelovitch and Bauer 2000 ). A debriefing to prevent the recurrence of trauma was given to the participant right after every interview, which could last for 30 min to one-and-a-half hours. All audio-recorded interviews were password-secured and were only transcribed and translated by language-proficient staff and verified by the researchers for accuracy and consistency. For ethical reasons, participants’ names and other information were kept anonymous and replaced with pseudonyms.

Dialogical Narrative Analysis

Frank ( 2010 , 2012 ) coupled socio-narratology with his methodological technique – dialogical narrative analysis (DNA). DNA is a heuristic guide in analyzing stories. It is a combination of thematic, structural, and dialogical analyses (Smith 2016 ). DNA “studies the mirroring between what is told in the story – the story’s content – and what happens as a result of telling that story – its effects” (Frank 2010 , pp. 71–72). In other words, DNA is concerned with the content of stories and their effects on selves, affiliations, and actions. Although Frank ( 2010 , 2012 ) intended DNA to be heuristic in nature, there are phases of the analysis that can be implemented (see also Caddick 2016 ; Smith 2016 ). However, these phases are not necessarily linearly followed: even in a later phase, one can always return to the initial ones.

The present analysis started with getting the story phase done by the first researcher. Here, the stories in each interview were identified using Labov and Waletzky’s ( 1967 ) structural model of narratives. Then, the getting to grips with the stories phase was implemented by the two researchers. Indwelling with the data by listening to the audios and reading the transcripts several times was done at this phase. Also, narrative themes, relationships among themes, and the structure of the stories were identified. The opening up analytical dialogue phase followed by asking dialogical questions by the two authors directed towards the narratives identified (Frank 2012 ). This makes DNA unique from other analyses. Dialogical questions include resource questions, affiliation questions, and identity questions. Finally, pulling the analysis together phase was done by choosing among the five forms of DNA, the best way to structure the results. We chose to build a narrative typology as our approach. Narrative types are ‘the most general storyline[s] that can be recognized underlying the plot and tensions of particular stories’ (Frank 1995 : 75). After weeks of analysis, the data revealed three narrative types and their consequences, which are discussed in the next section.

The Narrative Types

This section shows that there are three significant narratives to which the participants of this study subscribe. These narratives are tragic resistance narrative, rescued slave narrative, and heroic saga narrative . The most common among these are the tragic resistance and the rescued slave narratives. The heroic saga narrative serves as a contesting narrative against the dominant ones. We will also show that these narratives interpellate the participants to assume particular identities (selves), connect or disconnect from alliances, and do things for and on them.

Tragic Resistance Narrative

Its structure.

A common narrative emplotted by some of the participants is the tragic resistance narrative. This narrative starts with some favorable situations, followed by a disruption in the form of sexual abuse. Due to fear of negative consequences, the participants subscribing to this narrative tended not to disclose their victimization. Moreover, if they disclosed, they did it covertly with those outside the family. This does not mean, however, that they did not do anything against the offender. They tended to make subtle but covert resistance against the abusers. This narrative has this structure: “Girls live a normal life. It is made horrible when they are raped. However, they could not disclose it because they fear that their resistance might fail as the abuser might retaliate.” This narrative appears to be a derivative of the culturally available rape myths such as “No woman can do much about rape” (Gordon and Riger 1989 ; Plummer 2003 ). Also, fear of retaliation among the sexual abuse victims in the Philippines circulates culturally (Hunt and Gatbonton 2000 ). Previous research also documents fears experienced by children and adolescents due to their abusive experiences (Foster and Hagedorn 2014 ; McElvaney et al. 2014 ; Schönbucher et al. 2012 ).

One example of this kind of narrative is a story told by Mary, who was raped by her father. She said,

That night, he came home very drunk. My brother and I only slept side by side in the sala of our house. Then my father laid down in between my brother and me and started to undress me. I said, “No, Pa,” but he held a knife and said that he would kill me if I refused. So, he succeeded in undressing me and finally raped me. When he inserted his penis into my vagina, it was very painful. It happened when I have not even had my first menstruation yet. When I tried to move, he would threaten me with the knife.

Mary did not continue to resist because of the threat made by her father to kill her if she would fight. She emplotted her experience in a tragic resistance narrative yet did not offer more resistance. Other participants’ stories unfolded through this type of narrative. Ana, for instance, shared this story:

One time when my Mama left, my father and my siblings were left at home. Then he [stepfather] attempted to rape me, but I shouted, and it was on time that my Mama came back. So Mama had the incident blottered. My stepfather was so mad. Eventually, he was put behind bars because my godmother, who was a policewoman, helped us. We went home to Zamboanguita because we were in Bayawan during that time. We did not know that he was temporarily freed but he was able to post bail. He came back and planned to kill us all. He murdered Mama, who was pregnant. I was almost killed too. He almost killed Lolo. If Lolo was not able to kill him, all of us could have been killed. Lolo killed him at that time.

Ana related that she screamed when her stepfather attempted to rape her and her mother reported it to the police. Then, the offender was arrested and detained. However, such resistance was tragic. When the offender was able to post bail, he retaliated and killed her pregnant mother and almost killed her, but her grandfather eventually killed him. This tragic resistance created extreme fear in her as she relayed, “.. . that is what I fear. Because of me, my family would kill each other.”

Jess took the same narrative to describe her initial resistance against her stepfather. It was not her stepfather, however, who foiled her resistance. It was her mother. Her mother prevented Jess’s attempt to resist. She said: “He abused me every night, and if I said no, he would go wild. I was angry with my Mama because she did not believe me.”

Tragic Resistance Narrative’s Effects on the Self, Relationships, and Actions

With the tragic resistance narrative, the participants experienced what Freeman ( 2010 ) calls narrative foreclosure , wherein one believes that he or she has no or little prospect for the future. This is detrimental to the self. Some participants experienced hopelessness and even considered committing suicide. This kind of narrative led them to offer little (covert) or no resistance against subsequent abuses. They even became emotionally attached to their abusers.

Dirty and Foreclosed Self

When asked what she felt immediately after the abuse, Jess described herself as

“Filthy. I considered myself filthy because my being had been devastated by a person who was good for nothing .”

She also felt that her future was foreclosed as she lamented,

“I felt hopeless. I felt like I was already totally hopeless. I can’t think of any solution to the problem during that time. I thought there was nobody who could help me because I was hesitant to tell anybody.”

Ana and Mary had the same thought about themselves immediately after the repeated sexual abuse. And after a considerable number of years, they still felt marred by such molestations, although not as intense as immediately after the incidents. For instance, Mary still felt her womanhood tarnished:

“Sometimes, I feel I am the filthiest person. My father sexually abused me.”

Ana had a similar struggle with herself even long after the event. She continued to experience confusion about herself.

Interviewer: Let me ask you this, “How is Ana?” Ana: Tired. Interviewer: What makes Ana tired? Ana: It’s like I do not understand myself.

“Yes, we see each other because her peers are also our classmates, but we feel nothing more than friends. She would just tell me to take care, then we go our separate ways. She asked me why I get attracted to girls. I said I am not attracted to girls; I get attracted to boyish girls. I used to get attracted to boys, but now I hate them. I never had feelings towards lesbians before. When a cousin of mine got into a relationship with a lesbian, I even admonished her from getting involved with the same sex. I wonder why I have changed. Ate Lyn even asked me why I got into a relationship with a girl.”

Emotional Attachment with the Abuser

The tragic resistance narrative invites the participants to build an emotional attachment with the abusers. This is in line with some qualitative research that documented children’s conflicted feelings toward their abusers (Morrison et al. 2018 ). Probably, this is to prevent any harmful retaliatory acts from the abuser towards the abused or to their significant others or to make the abusers believe that they were not resisting.

For instance, after she was abused for the first time, Ana lived with her uncle; she was again raped by her cousin. This time, she did not resist her cousin overtly after the death of her mother and her unborn child, which resulted from her previous overt resistance against her stepfather. Instead, she built a close relationship with her cousin and his family with which she was living. When asked about the frequentness of being abused by her cousin, Ana said:

“He did it to me, maybe two or three times in a month. Sometimes I got insulted because he would bring his girlfriend, and still continued to abuse me. (But) I had high respect for him as an older brother.”

Ana may have been “insulted” or probably jealous that her cousin had a girlfriend whom he brought latter to their house. This indicates her attachment with the abuser, which is also manifested in the last sentence, where she expressed her respect towards him as her elder brother. Ana treated him as part of her family and considered his family her own; in fact, she even participated in their family drinking sessions and became drunk at times. And just like Ana, Mary also became attached to her father, who raped her repeatedly. This was because she was concerned with what could happen to him if she would leave him. She said:

“He even told me that he wanted me for his wife because women avoid him. After all, he bathes only once a week. He smells foul and dirty. I was the one who did his laundry. Our neighbors kept on telling me to finish my studies so that I could get away from him. But it is difficult to leave him. I am concerned about him because every time he got drunk, he would wake up everybody and put a fight.”

Subtle Resistance and Disclosure

A tragic narrative calls one for inaction because of fear (Smith 2005 ). It curtails any hope for the future and halts one from advancing towards it. Similar things occurred among some of the participants. Despite the abuses, they stayed with their abusers. That is why they experienced repeated sexual abuse. Their actions were enactions dictated by the emplotted narrative of their experiences of abuse (Frank 2010 ). Their actions became dialogical copies of their narrative. Nevertheless, instead of not doing anything, they made subtle resistance and disclosure. They expressed their agency strategically in a covert way, possibly, to avoid retaliation from the offender.

Ana, for instance, feigned a pregnancy after experiencing repeated abuses. This was a very strategic ploy. It was effective and, at the same time, did not require her to create a disorder in the family; although, there were still risks associated with it. She shared:

“At the end of December, I pretentiously told him I was pregnant to stop him from raping me. He was terrified, and he did stop raping me. He even gave me some pills, but I did not take them.”

On the other hand, Kay employed playful covert resistance. She used jokes against her abuser, although it had no similar effect as that of Ana’s. For example, she said,

“Mama’s brother used to carry a gun and has abused me several times - five times already. At times, I would jokingly tell him: “You know, I will report what happened; I will report you, Uncle, to the police station.” But, he wasn’t thinking that I was joking. I asked him, “Uncle, how many times have you done it to me already? Do you remember you stripped me naked, you removed my panty and my skirt and then kissed me in the mouth, my breasts, and licked my bottom?” After that, he warned me: “Do not to tell your father, mother, and my older brother -- because if you do, I will shoot them.” I said, “Yes, Uncle, I understand.” I was crying at that time.”

In this case, the participants made subtle disclosures – although not within their immediate family. They disclosed to their friends, neighbors, and the police. Mary opened to her neighbors (boarders), who were also caught in a tragic resistance narrative. This time, it is the neighbor’s daughter who was almost raped by her drunk father. But they did not report it to the authorities. She shared this:

“They asked me what my father did to me, but I did not answer them; I only cried. They said it would be New Year so I should have a new life and should not be staying at home always. That prompted me to tell them what happened to me. They asked me how I should deal with the situation. That was it; they were also afraid to report to the police because my father warned that whoever will help me, will be killed. He also warned of killing my brother and me if I would tell anybody about the incident.”

Ana made a similar kind of disclosure to the mother of her best friend. She did not disclose it to her uncle, who supported her, because she feared that a similar tragic event in her family would occur again. Ana said:

Interviewer: Did you tell anybody? Ana: I didn’t tell anyone except the mother of my best friend whom I trusted most. Interviewer: What prompted you to tell? Ana: Because I could no longer bear the thought that even his father can do the same to me when we were supposed to be kins. So I told the mother of my classmate, and she even cried.

Rescued Slave Narrative

Another common narrative invoked by the participants is the rescued slave narrative. This is a progressive type of narrative (Gergen and Gergen 1988 ). Emancipation was the key theme in this narrative: emancipation from the bondage of sex slavery and other forms of oppression. However, this emancipation was not the participants’ initiative but of other people and a Higher Being. The agency on the part of the participants was minimal, especially in terms of disclosure and resistance. This narrative’s typical structure is: “Women are subjected to slavery and other forms of oppression. They become martyr slaves and break down inside. Somebody rescues them, and they are freed from the bondage of their abusers.”

Joy had employed this kind of narrative. She was repeatedly raped by her grandfather as if she were a sex slave. She broke down and cried. She was asked why and then she disclosed. Then, some people helped her get her grandfather arrested and incarcerated.

“The first time I got raped was when I was eight years old. Since then, I was raped by my Lolo several times. I never told anyone about it because he warned me not to. Every time he gets drunk, he would rape me. One time, my Lola's sibling was in the house, and my nephews and nieces, Lolo started to rape me. However, I cried, so they asked me why I was crying. It was then that I told them about it. They helped me get my abuser jailed.”

This rescued slave narrative tends to be a mimetic copy of her slave narrative before the sexual abuses occurred. The same is also true with the other participants who employed this kind of narrative. Their narrative of the abuses was dialogical (Frank 2010 ) because it cohered with the narratives of their lives before the abuses. We can see that Joy’s slave narrative during the abuses formed a dialogue with her narrative of her experiences before the abuses. Both narratives cohered. Joy shared that before the abuses happened,

“I used to babysit my nephew and niece. When I get home, I would fetch water. And sometimes, I get home late after traveling on foot because we had no money to pay for a ride from school which was quite a distance, and I get whipped, and the child of my Lola (grand) would hit me on the head when I commit an offense."

The participants used the same type of slave narrative to emplot the abuses but in a progressive mode due to the rescue being made by others.

Jean, likewise, used the same rescued slave narrative. She experienced trauma after her employer abused her, and she seldom talked with her co-workers; she was in shock and absent-minded. It was her boyfriend and her mother who rescued her. She recounted her rescue moment:

“I was already at home one evening. My boyfriend noticed that I wasn’t my usual self and appeared bothered. Then I confided to him about the abuse. The following day my mother went to the police to report.”

Meanwhile, Bem had a similar narrative:

Interviewer: What prompted you, Bem, to speak up? Who was the first person you have spoken to? Bem: My aunt. Interviewer: Why did you speak up? Bem: They confronted me, saying, “Bem, we heard stories that your brother has molested you.” I said, “Yes, Auntie, and I don’t know why.” And she said to me, “Just don’t tell him; we will just report it.”

It was only when her aunt confronted Bem that she disclosed. This was typical in the rescued slave narrative. These participants were powerless, martyr victims. They broke down, and people noticed their depressive symptoms and then asked them why, and that was when they eventually disclosed.

Rescued Slave narrative’s Effects on the Self, Relationships, and Actions

The participants who employed the rescued slave narrative saw themselves as powerless against the oppressive forces which perpetrated sexual abuses and other forms of torment. But, they were rescued after others noticed the pain they just kept inside them. This type of narrative has profound effects on the self, relationships, and actions of these participants.

Rescued Slave Identity

On the other hand, some participants in this study also assumed the rescued slave identity. With this identification, they felt relieved to have been freed from their oppressors. Some frequently heard words in these narratives include “makagawas ” (to be free), “move on,” and “ nahuwasan ” (relieved). Another participant named Kat reported that,

“After arriving here (crisis center), I felt relaxed because nobody bothers me anymore, especially at night. I am thrilled to learn that I have many companions here who are also victims like me. I thought I was the only one who had experienced such an ordeal. I am happy because no matter what, there are people who could help.”

This kind of narrative was also captured in the stories of Joy. She recounted that she was happy after leaving the house of her abusive grandfather. She said:

“I am happy I have left the house of my Lolo and met some people here in the city. In here (crisis center), I feel like they are my family.”

However, this narrative only indicates that the abused just keep a physical distance away from their abusers. Like in the account of Joy, this physical or spatial dimension only allowed them to escape in space but not in memories. The stigma associated with their slave identity remained, and getting rescued would not wipe away the stains. This slave identity still dwells in them. After being rescued, Joy again employed the same type of narrative, this time in another form of oppression:

“Where I used to stay was quite okay, but I still felt a little sad because the sibling of my auntie was a bit nosy on me and my personal belongings and went around telling unpleasant and unreal things about me. Now I am okay that I am out of that place.”

Kim had a similar experience of oppression after being freed from sexual abuse. He could not escape the stigma of having a slave identity, and neither could he escape its enslaving memories . Like Kim, Jean recounted these memories:

“I am attempting to disregard what happened. I want to move on now. But I could not avoid remembering it, mostly since our courses now talk about court cases. So, I would have no reactions; I keep quiet, and I do not study the lessons. However, I try to overcome it as much as I could.”

Disaffiliation from the Abusers

Within the tragic resistance narrative , the participants developed an emotional attachment with the abusers; on the contrary, the participants were disaffiliated or disconnected from their abusers and connected with those who rescued them in the rescued slave narrative . The participants were happy to have escaped from the control of their abusers and tried as much as possible to keep their distance from them. All they wanted was for the abusers to be punished.

While Joy was delighted to leave her grandfather’s house, Bem also learned that her father had known the abuses done by his brother towards her when she was still 5 years old; however, instead of standing by her side, he blamed her and calling her slutty. This changed Bem’s perception of her father, so she decided not to stay with them anymore.

As for Jean’s abuser’s daughter-in-law, who befriended her on Facebook :

“I want this case to be resolved, especially that he has not been arrested and is currently free. On Facebook, his daughter-in-law sent a friend request to me. I wonder how she knew my Facebook profile and why she sent a friend request. I just disregard her.”

Therefore, the participants were disaffiliated from their abusers, and those they believed were their cohorts. They executed what the rescued slave narrative demands, and this is to separate and leave their abusers in space as traditional slave rescue dictates. As a result, they became more connected with their heroes who rescued them.

Emotional Resistance and Disclosure

The classic slave narrative demands that the slaves be submissive to their masters and be martyrs regardless of the oppression and abuses (Jacobs 2009 ). This narrative had a profound impact on some of the participants. They executed what this narrative demands and played martyrs to the repeated sexual abuses.

This action prevented them from initiating the disclosure process; however, this does not mean that they did not participate in the disclosure process. Although their rescuers initiated the disclosure by asking and confronting them upon seeing them in distress, the participants were truly part of the ritual. The participants’ emotional manifestations of anxiety, depression, and shock were part of the slave narrative. Apparently, they used these to let others know that there was something wrong with them. This cue invited the “heroes” to make sense of their tormenting situation and initiate the disclosure process. Such is what happened to Joy in her previous recount “…so they asked me why I was crying. It was then that I told them about it. They helped me get my abuser jailed.” Her aching emotions were a form of resistance and disclosure, albeit not in words.

Heroic Saga Narrative

The last of the narrative types is the heroic saga narrative. Here, the protagonist is characterized as undergoing a “continuous array of battles against the powers of darkness” (Gergen and Gergen 1988 : 26). This character experiences a series of ups and downs; the theme is progressive but ends in success. This narrative is generally “an adventure tale with several stops where the protagonist encounters trials, oppositions, and challenges but overcomes such testing and emerges as victorious.” This narrative serves as a counter-story to the most dominant and common narratives - tragic resistance and rescued slave narratives. Specifically, only one participant in this study emplotted her experiences through this narrative. May had a similar and could be a much worse experience than some of the participants. She was molested repeatedly by multiple offenders. Unfortunately, along with her, her twin was also abused by her abusers. However, she employed the heroic saga narrative portraying herself as the hero who was in control of herself and the situations she was in. Much can be learned from her. As she recounted:

“I do not know. When my stepfather molested me, I was not in the right mind because my nephew was in the hospital with a 50-50 chance of surviving. My twin and my elder sister were the ones who were in the hospital while I was left at home. On that day, Mama was in the market; it was noontime. He called me to get inside the house because I was at the store. He was holding a knife and told me to sit in the cot and remove my clothes. I refused to remove my clothes despite his insistence until my mother arrived. He dropped the knife beside me and ran to the restroom.

Notice that despite the repeated demands of the abuser, she did not obey his order to undress herself until her mother arrived. This kind of narrative is resonant with the narrative type of the story of the second abuse she shared. This time her brother-in-law attempted to abuse her, but she did not bend to his demand. She was hit, so she screamed aloud, and her sister discovered about this attempted abuse. May recalled:

“He grabbed my leg and pulled me downstairs, but I managed to climb upstairs and hold tight to my twin. He called me to go to him, but I did not. I whispered to my twin. I said, “Jam, our brother. . .” Jam clutched me tighter. The two of us were bracing each other so that I could not be pulled down. Because I did not give in, he hit me, causing me to scream. The commotion roused my elder sister, Che. She asked me what happened. He went downstairs, and I said, “Our brother hit me.” As he resumed his drinking, my sister called him, resulting in another fracas.”

Still, there was another instance when her brother-in-law fondled her. She ran away afterward. With this, she acted with full agency and full control of herself and her situation. She was not a helpless, powerless girl submitting herself to a master, and she was not afraid of retaliation. She fought. She said:

“There was also a time when my older sister told me to stay home because she was going someplace. Our brother started touching me (during that time, I was already working). The following day, I did not return home. My twin and I left. We searched for a new job until we reached Pampanga and found a very kind employer. We stayed there for a long time and have not seen our sister and our Mama since then. “

Heroic Saga Narrative’s Effects on the Self, Relationships, and Actions

The heroic saga narrative had far-reaching effects on the identity, relationships, and actions of May. She viewed herself as a hero who did not wait for help from her family members. She fought her way to free herself from the bondage of her sexual abusers.

Heroic Identity and Heroic Actions

In the adventure tale that she had emplotted, May stood as the main protagonist. Although the heroic saga narrative is characterized by the hero as the abused, it also has a progressive theme similar to that of the rescued slave identity where the hero is the rescuer. In the case of May, she had the full agency and control of herself and her situation. She did not let her situation or other people dictate what to feel, think, and do.

In line with the heroic narrative, she felt much stronger about how she coped with the abuses than others who would typically break down. May said:

“Difficult. I do not know. The good thing was, for example, if this happened to other people, I think they would already break down. It was a good thing that although there were so many challenges that came to my life, I stood my ground and was able to surmount them all. Even in this recent ordeal, I fought and remained strong.”

She narrated that she had fought and survived and even acted in full control of her abuser at one point. She even objected that her brother-in-law’s term of imprisonment be lowered:

May: I wanted him incarcerated for six to eight years, but he pleaded for three years or below. I was against it, but I told the fiscal that if he did not agree, I would testify [in court]. Interviewer: Oh, did they move for amicable settlement? May: Yes, but when [social worker] and I went to the Hall of Justice on September 11, it was Monday, they agreed to my offer of six to eight years.

In this part, the word “my offer” implies that May was in full control. She was the one offering – suggesting that the fate of her abuser was in her hands. She also had good future aspirations: “Everything is now clear because the case is already over. I have a plan to go back to my school before in Piapi. My elder brother asked me whether I would continue. I said, “Yes.”

In terms of her affiliations, she found connections and easy identifications with those people who had similar narratives with her. She could open up her problems and shared her experiences with people who, in a way, lifted her spirit. Moreover, the heroic narrative also seemed to wipe away all the stigma of the abuses. During the interview, she reported having no negative feelings because “I do not mind it anymore… it’s harmful to me. It is nothing to me anymore.”

May’s reaction could entirely be different from that of the dominant tragic resistance and rescued slave narratives. Unlike the rest where the stigma remains, her narrative tells that she has won over the torment.

The purpose of this paper was to describe the narrative types and effects of the stories of sexual abuse experiences of Filipino children and adolescents in their childhood and adolescence. The study is essential in filling up gaps in the literature on child and adolescent sexual abuse. Also, it introduces an alternative narrative analysis – dialogical narrative analysis – in analyzing stories on sexual abuse. With this perspective, stories are seen as retrospective and prospective polyphonic and heteroglossic devices in representing actions and experiences. Narratives as cultural symbols tend to have influences on children and adolescents’ adjustment after sexual abuse experiences. The study provides an answer to Morrison et al.’s ( 2018 ) conflicting results of their review. In their review, some studies show that fear may or may not prompt children to disclose, and they attribute this to the type of abuse experienced. However, we argue that it is not primarily the type of event that occurred, but the type of narrative a particular child or adolescent takes to narrate her story that influences her reactions to the abuse, as shown by the idiosyncratic effects of the three narrative types in this study. As Rabih Alameddine ( 2009 , p.450) notes: “Events matter little, only stories of those events affect us.”

We found three different ‘narrative types’ (Frank 1995 ) in the stories of 10 female Filipinos who experienced sexual abuse. These narrative types are tragic resistance narrative, rescued slave narrative, and heroic saga narrative. We coined these narrative types by loosely basing it on the narrative typology suggested by Smith ( 2016 ). These narratives have idiosyncratic consequences on the identities, social affiliations, and actions of the participants. This supports the contentions of socio-narratology that narratives do not just represent actions but also act prospectively in influencing what identities the participants would take, whom they would affiliate, and what actions to take (Frank 2010 , 2012 ).

We can also see the influence of the Filipino culture on the narratives of the participants. This influence demonstrates the heteroglossic and polyphonic nature of narratives (Frank 2012 ). Filipinos are communitarian (Guevara 2005 ). With this, relationships are highly valued. Thus, the interests of the family and the community are considered superior to individual interests. This is probably the primary reason why most of the participants’ stories were told in the tragic resistance and rescued slave narrative. They were afraid that if they disclosed the abuses, it would ruin family relationships. Moreover, those who used rescued slave narratives tended to be highly dependent on family and friends’ help. The self and its interests were sidetracked as only one participant storied her life in a heroic and individualistic manner.

Although the study is informative, it is not without limitations. Contextual limitations are present in the study. Other contexts might provide different narrative types and consequences of such narratives because the culture is at play in narrative research. Thus, we join other scholars’ call in conducting more qualitative studies on children’s and adolescents’ narrative voices on their sexual abuse experiences. Also, the study is limited in the type of participants. The present study analyzed stories of those who had been admitted to a crisis center. Stories of victims who have no such admission might differ. Thus, future research should explore the narrative voices of victims not admitted to crisis centers.

The study is also limited in terms of focusing only on the structure and consequences of the narrative. It has not delved into what influences one to take such a narrative. Thus, future research could address this limitation by looking into the personal and contextual variabilities in the production of stories. It has also been widely acknowledged that interviewing is a co-production between the research participant and the interviewer (Gubrium and Holstein 2009 ; Holstein and Gubrium 1995 ). The interviewer exerts an influence on the stories produced. Thus, the interviewer (first author) might have a unique influence on the participants. Nevertheless, she built enough rapport to address this. Future research can still employ less intrusive ways of conducting narrative analysis, like visual analysis (Riessman 2008 ).

This study is just a step going forward in employing the narrative approach to sexual abuse studies. It is only a primary seed for exploring both the ‘whats’ and especially the ‘hows,’ which have been neglected in narrative research (Gubrium and Holstein 2009 ). Future research could explore the different dimensions of narrative analysis – thematic, structural, dialogical, and even visual (Riessman 2008 ). Moreover, we argue that future scholars should take guidance from Frank’s ( 2010 , 2012 ) socio-narratology and dialogical narrative analysis to do this. Socio-narratology addresses the theoretical and methodological needs implied by Gibson and Morgan ( 2013 ). They argued that there is a need for sexual abuse research to analyze the linkages among contexts, abuse, and consequences of these abuses as illuminated by stories, which do not neglect contexts and idiosyncrasies of different experiences studies suffer.

Future studies could also build upon the current findings, especially on the three narrative types. There may be other narrative types available in other localities as culture and contexts provide variability in narratives. Moreover, these narratives are the resources people use to tell their stories (Frank 2010 , 2012 ; Harrington  2008 ; Riessman 2008 ). Thus, sexual abuse stories may differ in other places. Other researchers could pursue this line of inquiry.

Moreover, it is suggested that more studies on child sexual abuse be done in the Philippines. A recent review found a lack of research on child maltreatment, especially on sexual abuse. Sexual abuse has been known to have far-reaching adverse consequences for the victims, and more research can be conducted about this (Roche 2017 ). Moreover, the narrative approach could give an avenue to hear these victims’ ‘voices,’ especially with the recent interest in cultural studies of children and adolescents’ sexual abuse experiences.

Authors contribution

Conceptualization: [Nora Maria Elena T. Osmeña, Dan Jerome S. Barrera], Methodology: [Nora Maria Elena T. Osmeña]; Formal analysis and investigation: [Nora Maria Elena T. Osmeña with the assistance of Dan Jerome S. Barrera]; Writing - original draft preparation: [Nora Maria Elena T. Osmeña]; Writing - review and editing: [Nora Maria Elena T. Osmeña, Dan Jerome S. Barrera]; Funding acquisition: [Nora Maria Elena T. Osmeña]; Resources: [Nora Maria Elena T. Osmeña].

Funding for this study was derived from the Commission on Higher Education [Philippines].

Compliance with Ethical Standards

All rules and regulations related to research with human participants were strictly followed. Ethical clearance was given by the Silliman University ethics committee.

Informed consent was obtained from the participants and authorized personnel.

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

This paper was a derivative of the doctoral dissertation of the first author at Silliman University, Dumaguete City, Philippines

Publisher’s Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

• Alaggia R, Collin-Vézina D, Lateef R. Facilitators and barriers to child sexual abuse (CSA) disclosures: A research update (2000–2016) Trauma, Violence, & Abuse. 2019; 20 (2):260–283. doi: 10.1177/1524838017697312. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Alameddine R. The Hakawati. New York: Anchor Books; 2009. [ Google Scholar ]
• Alexander JC, Smith P. The discourse of American civil society: A new proposal for cultural studies. Theory and Society. 1993; 22 (2):151–207. doi: 10.1007/BF00993497. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Amado BG, Arce R, Herraiz A. Psychological injury in victims of child sexual abuse: A meta-analytic review. Psychosocial Intervention. 2015; 24 (1):49–62. doi: 10.1016/j.psi.2015.03.002. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Barth J, Bermetz L, Heim E, Trelle S, Tonia T. The current prevalence of child sexual abuse worldwide: A systematic review and meta-analysis. International Journal of Public Health. 2013; 58 (3):469–483. doi: 10.1007/s00038-012-0426-1. [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Bruner J. Life as narrative. Social Research. 1987; 54 (1):11–32. [ Google Scholar ]
• Caddick N. Doing narrative analysis. In: Lyons E, Coyle A, editors. Analysing qualitative data in psychology. London: SAGE Publications; 2016. [ Google Scholar ]
• Capella C, Lama X, Rodríguez L, Águila D, Beiza G, Dussert D, Gutierrez C. Winning a race: Narratives of healing and psychotherapy in children and adolescents who have been sexually abused. Journal of Child Sexual Abuse. 2016; 25 (1):73–92. doi: 10.1080/10538712.2015.1088915. [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Carr D. Time, narrative, and history. Bloomington: Indiana University Press; 1986. [ Google Scholar ]
• Council for the Welfare of Children & UNICEF. (2016). National baseline study on violence against children: Philippines. CWC & UNICEF Philippines. Retrieved from https://uni.cf/2YUDKOq .
• Foster JM, Hagedorn WB. Through the eyes of the wounded: A narrative analysis of children’s sexual abuse experiences and recovery process. Journal of Child Sexual Abuse. 2014; 23 (5):538–557. doi: 10.1080/10538712.2014.918072. [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Frank AW. The wounded storyteller: Body, illness, and ethics. Chicago: University of Chicago Press; 1995. [ Google Scholar ]
• Frank AW. Letting stories breathe: A socio-narratology. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press; 2010. [ Google Scholar ]
• Frank AW. Practicing dialogical narrative analysis. In: Holstein J, Gubrium J, editors. Varieties of narrative analysis. London: SAGE Publications; 2012. [ Google Scholar ]
• Freeman M. Hindsight: The promise and peril of looking backward. New York: Oxford University Press; 2010. [ Google Scholar ]
• Gergen KJ, Gergen MM. Narrative and the self as relationship. In: Berkowitz L, editor. Advances in experimental social psychology. New York: Academic Press; 1988. [ Google Scholar ]
• Gibson K, Morgan M. Narrative research on child sexual abuse: Addressing perennial problems in quantitative research. Qualitative Research in Psychology. 2013; 10 (3):298–317. doi: 10.1080/14780887.2011.606597. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Gordon MT, Riger S. The female fear. New York: The Free Press; 1989. [ Google Scholar ]
• Gubrium JF, Holstein JA. Analyzing narrative reality. Thousand Oaks: SAGE Publications; 2009. [ Google Scholar ]
• Guevara JP. Pakikipagkapwa [sharing/merging oneself with others] In: Gripaldo RM, editor. Filipino cultural traits . Washington: The Council for Research in Values and Philosophy; 2005. [ Google Scholar ]
• Harrington, A. (2008). The cure within: A history of mind-body medicine . New York: NY: W.W. Norton & Company.
• Harvey MR, Mishler EG, Koenen K, Harney PA. In the aftermath of sexual abuse: Making and remaking meaning in narratives of trauma and recovery. Narrative Inquiry. 2000; 10 (2):291–311. doi: 10.1075/ni.10.2.02har. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Hillberg T, Hamilton-Giachritsis C, Dixon L. Review of meta-analyses on the association between child sexual abuse and adult mental health difficulties: A systematic approach. Trauma, Violence, & Abuse. 2011; 12 (1):38–49. doi: 10.1177/1524838010386812. [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Holstein JA, Gubrium JF. The active interview. London: Sage; 1995. [ Google Scholar ]
• Hunt, D. D., & Gatbonton, C. S. (2000). Filipino women and sexual violence: Speaking out and providing services. Australia: Solidarity Philippines Australia Network. Retrieved from http://cpcabrisbane.org/CPCA/IWSSForum.htm .
• Hunter SV. Evolving narratives about childhood sexual abuse: Challenging the dominance of the victim and survivor paradigm. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Family Therapy. 2010; 31 (2):176–190. doi: 10.1375/anft.31.2.176. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Jackson S, Newall E, Backett-Milburn K. Children's narratives of sexual abuse. Child & Family Social Work. 2015; 20 (3):322–332. doi: 10.1111/cfs.12080. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Jacobs HA. Incidents in the life of a slave girl: Written by herself. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; 2009. [ Google Scholar ]
• Jensen TK, Gulbrandsen W, Mossige S, Reichelt S, Tjersland OA. Reporting possible sexual abuse: A qualitative study on children's perspectives and the context for disclosure. Child Abuse & Neglect. 2005; 29 (12):1395–1413. doi: 10.1016/j.chiabu.2005.07.004. [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Jovchelovitch S, Bauer M. Narrative interviewing. In: Bauer M, Gaskell G, editors. Qualitative researching with text, image and sound. London: Sage; 2000. pp. 57–74. [ Google Scholar ]
• Labov W, Waletzky J. Narrative analysis: Oral versions of personal experience. In: Helm J, editor. Essays on the verbal and visual arts. Seattle: University of Washington Press; 1967. [ Google Scholar ]
• MacIntyre A. After virtue: A study in moral theory. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press; 1981. [ Google Scholar ]
• Maniglio R. The impact of child sexual abuse on health: A systematic review of reviews. Clinical Psychology Review. 2009; 29 (7):647–657. doi: 10.1016/j.cpr.2009.08.003. [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• McElvaney R, Greene S, Hogan D. To tell or not to tell? Factors influencing young people’s informal disclosures of child sexual abuse. Journal of Interpersonal Violence. 2014; 29 (5):928–947. doi: 10.1177/0886260513506281. [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Morrison SE, Bruce C, Wilson S. Children’s disclosure of sexual abuse: A systematic review of qualitative research exploring barriers and facilitators. Journal of Child Sexual Abuse. 2018; 27 (2):176–194. doi: 10.1080/10538712.2018.1425943. [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Norman RE, Byambaa M, De R, Butchart A, Scott J, Vos T. The long-term health consequences of child physical abuse, emotional abuse, and neglect: A systematic review and meta-analysis. PLoS Medicine. 2012; 9 (11):e1001349. doi: 10.1371/journal.pmed.1001349. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Plummer K. Telling sexual stories: Power, change and social worlds. London: Routledge; 2003. [ Google Scholar ]
• Polkinghorne DE. Narrative knowing and the human sciences. Albany, NY: SUNY Press; 1988. [ Google Scholar ]
• Ramiro LS, Madrid BJ, Brown DW. Adverse childhood experiences (ACE) and health-risk behaviors among adults in a developing country setting. Child Abuse & Neglect. 2010; 34 (11):842–855. doi: 10.1016/j.chiabu.2010.02.012. [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Ricoeur P. Time and narrative. Chicago: University of Chicago Press; 1984. [ Google Scholar ]
• Riessman CK. Narrative methods for the human sciences. New York: SAGE Publications; 2008. [ Google Scholar ]
• Roche S. Child protection and maltreatment in the Philippines: A systematic review of the literature. Asia & the Pacific Policy Studies. 2017; 4 (1):104–128. doi: 10.1002/app5.167. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• San Diego RJS. Healing the invisible wounds of trauma: A qualitative analysis. Asia Pacific Journal of Counselling and Psychotherapy. 2011; 2 (2):151–170. doi: 10.1080/21507686.2011.588243. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Sanjeevi J, Houlihan D, Bergstrom KA, Langley MM, Judkins J. A review of child sexual abuse: Impact, risk, and resilience in the context of culture. Journal of Child Sexual Abuse. 2018; 27 (6):622–641. doi: 10.1080/10538712.2018.1486934. [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Schaeffer P, Leventhal JM, Asnes AG. Children's disclosures of sexual abuse: Learning from direct inquiry. Child Abuse & Neglect. 2011; 35 (5):343–352. doi: 10.1016/j.chiabu.2011.01.014. [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Schönbucher V, Maier T, Mohler-Kuo M, Schnyder U, Landolt MA. Disclosure of child sexual abuse by adolescents: A qualitative in-depth study. Journal of Interpersonal Violence. 2012; 27 (17):3486–3513. doi: 10.1177/0886260512445380. [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Smith P. Why war? The cultural logic of Iraq, the Gulf war, and Suez. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press; 2005. [ Google Scholar ]
• Smith B. Narrative analysis. In: Lyons E, Coyle A, editors. Analysing qualitative data in psychology. London: SAGE Publications; 2016. [ Google Scholar ]
• Teicher MH, Samson JA. Annual research review: Enduring neurobiological effects of childhood abuse and neglect. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry. 2016; 57 (3):241–266. doi: 10.1111/jcpp.12507. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Tener D, Murphy SB. Adult disclosure of child sexual abuse: A literature review. Trauma, Violence, & Abuse. 2015; 16 (4):391–400. doi: 10.1177/1524838014537906. [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Watkins-Kagebein J, Barnett TM, Collier-Tenison S, Blakey J. They don’t listen: A qualitative interpretive meta-synthesis of children’s sexual abuse. Child and Adolescent Social Work Journal. 2019; 36 (4):337–349. doi: 10.1007/s10560-019-00615-w. [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Wong G, Breheny M. Narrative analysis in health psychology: A guide for analysis. Health Psychology and Behavioral Medicine. 2018; 6 (1):245–261. doi: 10.1080/21642850.2018.1515017. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]

Academia.edu no longer supports Internet Explorer.

To browse Academia.edu and the wider internet faster and more securely, please take a few seconds to  upgrade your browser .

Enter the email address you signed up with and we'll email you a reset link.

• We're Hiring!
• Help Center

Socio-Cultural Perspectives of Child Discipline and Child Abuse in the Philippines

Acta Medica Philippina

Objectives. This study used a descriptive, qualitative design to explore the local understanding of child discipline and analyze the important link between parental discipline and child abuse. Methods. Focus group discussions and key informant interviews were conducted with parents, children, local leaders, and professionals in 6 rural communities in the Philippines. The respondents were asked which corrective behaviors they would consider acceptable or abusive to children by showing them a list of disciplinary acts. Results. The results showed an adequate understanding of the purpose and intent of child discipline. Children are generally disciplined to teach them good values, mold and shape their characters and equip them with a moral sense of right and wrong. Child discipline is considered already harmful if: the child sustains physical injuries and psychological pain; the disciplinary action is not commensurate to the offense committed by the child and is used frequently and repe...

Related Papers

Fe Competente

Meita Dhamayanti

Background Child abuse (CA) is a serious problem and difficult to detect. According to World Health Organization (WHO), CA is responsible on 950,000 deaths in children aged below 18 every year. As many cultures as various of CA among parents inside. This research aims to determine the cultural perceptions of child abuse in terms of parents in Indonesia. Method A qualitative study using focus group discussions was conducted to thirty one parents that selected purposively. The discussion centered about CA definition, classification, and frequency, level of CA (mild, moderate, and severe), the difference between violence and discipline. The focus group discussions divided in to 3 groups level education, Elementary/Junior high school, senior high school, and bachelor’s degree. The process offocus group discussion were recorded, transcribed, and analyzed using manifest qualitative content analysis. Results Every cultures in Indonesia perceived that CA is a form of parents’ emotion which ...

Wanda Hunter , Sergio Munoz , Beatriz Viscarra , Isabel Bordin

International journal of social sciences

Jun-Jun Ramos

Discipline is the most important thing in everyone’s life without discipline one cannot live a happy life. It is an act of living life following the rule and regulation. But, everyone should have self-discipline because it is important to achieve complete discipline in life and it also helps to develop better character of the person. This study aims to determine the discipline techniques of parents to their children. It includes 45 respondents from different barangay of Cabatuan to avoid prejudice of their perceptions. The researchers used quantitative researches were chosen by the process of checklist and survey questionnaire method to support the data collection. The result of the study indicates that parents always teach their children good manners and right conduct in which they want their children to become a respectful person. Further, if you respect oneself and other they will respect you too. However, there are still parents who used physical punishment such as spanking and ...

Journal of Pacific Rim Psychology

Joan E Durrant

Physical and emotional punishment of children is highly prevalent in the Asia-Pacific region. These actions predict a range of physical and emotional harms, prompting a worldwide effort to eliminate them. A key strategy in this effort is to change parental beliefs regarding the acceptability of physical and emotional punishment. The Positive Discipline in Everyday Parenting (PDEP) program was designed to change those beliefs by teaching parents about child development and strengthening their problem-solving skills. A sample of 377 parents in the Asia-Pacific region completed the program: 329 mothers and 47 fathers of children ranging in age from infancy to adolescence. The parents lived in Australia ( n = 135), Japan ( n = 172) or the Philippines ( n = 70). In all three countries, parents’ approval of punishment in general, and physical punishment specifically, declined and they became less likely to attribute typical child behavior to intentional misbehavior. By the end of the prog...

Child Abuse & Neglect

Rewadee Watakakosol

Pakistan Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences

Naqeeb Shah

Child abuse is one of the most serious problems in the world. The issue of child abuse is a major concern for governments around the globe, as it has a profound effect on society. As a result of this problem, many media houses, scholars and people from all walks of life are engaged in trying to understand and examine the problem of child abuse, especially in terms of causes and measures. The present study will provide beneficial and purposeful information on child physical abuse and the feasible relationship with cultural factors. Therefore, this study aims to highlight the major problems faced by children in the form of physical abuse in Malakand district. The purpose of the present study is to fulfill the research gap in Malakand District about the consequences of physical abuse of children who have experienced numerous or all types of physical abuse. The study was based on the interviews from the volunteers about Physical punishments in Malakand.

This study investigated dilemmas of corporal punishment of children from parents’ perspective in Jimma zone. Quantitative and qualitative approaches, 71 samples, questionnaire, interview, descriptive and thematic analyses were employed. Most parents corporally punish their children. Major contributing factors of the practice include cultural beliefs, social roles, parents’ childhood personal experiences, favorable conception of the practice and limited alternative forms of child disciplining. A dilemma regarding child corporal punishment arises on the distinction between child corporal punishment for disciplining and parent’s abusive behavior. Parents do not conceive child corporal punishment as a violation of children’s rights rather as their cultural responsibility of child nurturing. Parents in rural and urban communities differently view the potential and real effects of child corporal punishment. Male children are perceived as more knowledgeable and capable of controlli...

Journal of Humanities and Cultural Studies R&D , nayab ali

Journal of Pediatric Psychology

Antonio Sanhueza

RELATED PAPERS

Real-Time Systems

maryline chetto

Polymer Journal

Manuel Mendez

Revista Mexicana de Ciencias Agrícolas

Humberto Thomé Ortiz

arya wiradnyana

Journal of Comparative Physiology A

Journal of Engineering Science and Military Technologies

Ahmed Okasha

Journal of Urology

Doaa Sharaf

Jurnal Lebesgue : Jurnal Ilmiah Pendidikan Matematika, Matematika dan Statistika

Arif Wicaksono Septyanto

ORTHOPAEDICS, TRAUMATOLOGY and PROSTHETICS

American journal of cardiovascular drugs : drugs, devices, and other interventions

Jorge Velasco Saucedo

Salma juma Ramadhani

María Sol Yuan

Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı Elazığ Şubesi Yayınları

Ergün Öz AKÇORA

Computers in Human Behavior

Allyson Hadwin

International journal of psychology and behavioral sciences

Michael Axelman

Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences

Mobina Beheshti

Cerebrovascular diseases (Basel, Switzerland)

Lorenzo Pelloni

JIIP - Jurnal Ilmiah Ilmu Pendidikan

Lili Suryani

Hanxing Zhu

British Journal of Psychology

Johannes van Luit

International Journal of Elementary Education

Ayu Erawati

Tiempo Histórico

Elizabeth Lira

RELATED TOPICS

•   We're Hiring!
•   Help Center
• Find new research papers in:
• Health Sciences
• Earth Sciences
• Cognitive Science
• Mathematics
• Computer Science
• Academia ©2024

• COVID-19 Full Coverage
• Cover Stories
• Ulat Filipino
• Special Reports
• Personal Finance
• Other sports
• Pinoy Achievers
• Immigration Guide
• Science and Research
• Technology, Gadgets and Gaming
• Chika Minute
• Showbiz Abroad
• Family and Relationships
• Art and Culture
• Health and Wellness
• Shopping and Fashion
• Hobbies and Activities
• News Hardcore
• Walang Pasok
• Transportation
• Missing Persons
• Community Bulletin Board
• GMA Public Affairs
• State of the Nation
• Unang Balita
• Balitanghali
• News TV Live

80% of Pinoy children experience abuse – UNICEF report

Eighty percent of Filipino children have experienced at least one form of abuse in their entire lifetimes, according to the first-ever National Baseline Study on Violence Against Children (NBS-VAC) from the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and Council for the Welfare of Children (CWC) revealed on Tuesday.

Definitions of violence against children by UNICEF. National Baseline Study on Violence against Children in the PHL will be released today. pic.twitter.com/CRdgNU0HLz — Rie Takumi (@rie_takumi) December 6, 2016

Physical, psychological, sexual, and cyber violence, along with armed conflict, natural and man-made disasters, were reported by 80 percent of the 3,866 respondents aged 18 to 24 years from 17 regions of the country in the survey conducted in 2015.

UNICEF, DSWD, Council for the Welfare of Children launches the first National Baseline Study on Violence Against Children (NBS-VAC). pic.twitter.com/bVYZoX6ae2 — Rie Takumi (@rie_takumi) December 6, 2016

More than the figures, University of the Philippines – Manila professor and Principal Scientific Investigator Laurie Ramiro finds that the normalization of violence is worrisome despite more than half of respondents' (57.4 percent) claiming that they became “more resilient and strong” because of their experience.

“Our children look at the violence that they experience more or less positively. Some of their responses were they tried hard, they struggled to finish their studies, they felt better because they think they are being disciplined by their parents,” Ramiro said.

UP-Manila Prof Laura Ramiro says children see corporal punishment as a + because it is the norm; "This can have long-lasting consequences." pic.twitter.com/P5yPp5XuM5 — Rie Takumi (@rie_takumi) December 6, 2016

“It’s quite worrisome because as we know, corporal punishment and even verbal abuse, which is seen by most of our children as something which is acceptable and common in the Philippine setting, [can] have long-lasting consequences throughout [their] lifetime,” she continued.

The NBS-VAC in its report states that “all forms of violence have a negative impact on children’s development, and are discouraged based on research evidence that shows the long-term negative effects of violence on children’s mental, emotional and physical development.”

Social Welfare and Development Secretary Judy Taguiwalo said there are government mechanisms in place to address violence against children.

Apart from centers all over the country that counsel and take in abused children, the Department of Social Welfare and Development also links victims in reported cases to legal support.

“We have centers all over the country. [These] are centers for children who have been sexually abused, mainly incest victims, some of them have become pregnant. We provide shelters for them, as well as their children. We provide legal support for the persecution of the perpetrators,” Taguiwalo said.

Taguiwalo says DSWD's position is to maintain the current age for criminal liability; we have consulted w/ stakeholders, LGUs, govt agencies pic.twitter.com/suruRRgHHZ — Rie Takumi (@rie_takumi) December 6, 2016

Causes behind violence against children, such as poverty, are also addressed with scholarships to indigent children and the 4Ps program.

“We have the 4Ps. It’s not directly addressing violence against children, but it has helped provide a more favorable environment so that the children can go to school, the mothers can supervise them better,” said Taguiwalo.

Study findings

Three of five children or youths experienced physical (66.3 percent) and psychological abuse (59.2 percent) and bullying (65 percent) while one in five (17.1 percent) were sexually violated.

Most instances of physical violence during childhood occurred at home (60.4 percent), with 12.5 percent of children reporting “milder” forms of corporal punishment such as being “smothered, tied up or chained, made to stand with a heavy object or made to stand on mongo seed or pebbles.”

Madrid: In terms of moderate to severe physical punishment, PHL has 1 of highest prevalence rates in Asia. — Rie Takumi (@rie_takumi) December 6, 2016

About 59.2 percent of children experienced verbal abuse, threats, or threats of abandonment, during childhood. 7.9 percent of these children were subjected to severe psychological violence or felt or actual abandonment.

Gender factors in to violence: forced consummated sex is more prevalent among boys (4.1 percent for males, 2.3 percent for females) along with physical violence requiring hospitalization (2.8 percent to 1.9 percent); but there are more reports of females being murdered.

Common perpetrators of sexual violence are brothers or cousins. Males mostly experience sexual violence from cousins, fathers, and brothers.

LGBT children are also more prone to physical (75 percent to 65.9 percent in males and 61.8 percent in females), psychological (78.5 percent to 63.7 percent and 60 percent), and sexual violence (33.8 percent to 28.8 percent and 21.4 percent) than their heterosexual peers.

UNICEF's Sylwander says LGBT children exp. 3x higher rates of sexual violence from parents, relatives. pic.twitter.com/tU3mZihxyi — Rie Takumi (@rie_takumi) December 6, 2016

The NBS-VAC also states that armed conflict has displaced 2.6 percent of 2,303 participants in the survey; 94.6 percent claimed to have suffered from natural and man-made disasters in the past two years; and 43.8 percent of children aged 13 to 18 experienced cyber violence. — BM, GMA News

• High contrast
• OUR REPRESENTATIVE
• WORK FOR UNICEF
• NATIONAL AMBASSADORS
• PRESS CENTRE

Search UNICEF

Child abuse, more to explore.

• Press release (2)
• Philippines (4)

Online Sexual Abuse and Exploitation in the Philippines

SaferKidsPH advocates to stop online sexual abuse and exploitation of children

New partnership, SaferKidsPH, addresses online child abuse

National Baseline Study on Violence Against Children in the Philippines

A Perspective on Child Abuse in the Philippines

Looking at Institutional Factors

Cite this chapter

• Richard Velayo  

1234 Accesses

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

• Available as PDF
• Read on any device
• Instant download
• Own it forever
• Compact, lightweight edition
• Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
• Free shipping worldwide - see info
• Durable hardcover edition

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Unable to display preview.  Download preview PDF.

Amnesty International. (April 14, 2003). Philippines: A different childhood — the apprehension and detention of child suspects and offenders. Featured Paper (May, 2003). http://www.childprotection.org.ph/monthlyfeatures/jun2k3b.doc

Google Scholar  

Bennagen, P., Villones, B. & Eco, R. 1994. A Historical Study of the Child in Philippine Society . Quezon City: Salinlahi Foundation, Inc.

de la Cruz, T.; Protacio, E.; Balanon, F; Yacat, J. & Francisco, C. 2000. Trust and Power: Child Abuse in the Eyes of the Child and Parent . Philippines: United Nations Children’s Fund and Save the Children Fund.

Drilon, F.M. (October 5, 1998). Speech of Senator Franklin M. Drilon before the Centennial School Health and Nutrition Congress. Senator Franklin M. Drilon web site, Speeches, http://www.sendrilon.org.ph/speechl9981005.html.

Mabunga, R. (1997) Values reflected in and the laity’s response to the pastoral letters of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines. In S. Diokno (ed.), Democracy and Citizenship in Filipino Political Culture , p. 175–190.

Nepomuceno, L.C. (1981). Behavior Modification as an Approach to Problem Behaviors Encountered Among Elementary School Children . Unpublished MA Thesis, UP College of Social Sciences and Philosophy, Dept. of Psychology.

Philippine General Hospital Child Protection Unit. (1998). Annual Report . Manila: Advisory Board Foundation.

Protacio-Marcelino, E., de la Cruz, M.T.C., Balanon, F.A.G., Camacho, A.Z.V. & Yacat, J. (1998). Child abuse in the Philippines: An integrated literature review and annotated bibliography. Reprinted from UP-CIDS Chronicle , January–June 1998, http://www.childprotection.org.ph/monthlyfeatures/archives/archive0l.html

Protacio-Marcelino, E., dela Cruz, T., Balanon, F., Camacho, A. & Yacat, J. (2002). Child Abuse in the Philippines: An Integrated Literature Review and Annotated Bibliography . Quezon City: University of the Philippines Center for Integrative and Development Studies.

STI Prep School, STI Education Services Group. School violence: What parents can do . From Children’s Hospital of Pittsburg. http://www.sti.edu.ph/prepschool/html/schlviolence.html

Tan, F.L. (1982). Punishment: a Form of Social Control among Pangasinan Rural School Children . Unpublished PhD Dissertation. Quezon City: UP College of Education.

Tiongson, N. (1986). Kasaysayan ng Edukasyon sa Pilipinas (1863–1935) . Education Resource Enter Occasional Paper, Aug–Sept, 1986.

Valeriano, A. (2003). Within the premises: Child abuse in schools . Featured Paper, http://www.childprotection.org.ph/monthlyfeatures/archives/feb2k3b.html

Vernon, G.M. (1962). Sociology of Religion . New York: McGraw Hill, Inc. p. 174.

Yacat, J.A. & Ong, M.G. (2002). Beyond the home: Child abuse in the church and school . Featured Paper, http://www.childprotection.org.ph/monthlyfeatures/archives/ag2k2a.html

Download references

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Editor information

Editors and affiliations.

Pace University, New York, New York

Florence L. Denmark  & Herbert H. Krauss  & 

Psychological Dimensions, Inc., New York, New York

Robert W. Wesner

Columbia University, New York, New York

Elizabeth Midlarsky

St. Francis College, Brooklyn, New York

Uwe P. Gielen

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2005 Springer Science+Business Media, Inc.

About this chapter

Velayo, R. (2005). A Perspective on Child Abuse in the Philippines. In: Denmark, F.L., Krauss, H.H., Wesner, R.W., Midlarsky, E., Gielen, U.P. (eds) Violence in Schools. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/0-387-28811-2_10

Download citation

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/0-387-28811-2_10

Publisher Name : Springer, Boston, MA

Print ISBN : 978-0-387-23199-0

Online ISBN : 978-0-387-28811-6

eBook Packages : Behavioral Science Behavioral Science and Psychology (R0)

Share this chapter

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

• Publish with us

Policies and ethics

• Find a journal
• Track your research

In the Philippines, terrible crimes against children are often facilitated by their mothers

Warning: This story contains details of sexual abuse. 

Marie was lying on a mattress with her children on the floor of their home in Manila when the agents burst in.

One of the children was resting on a pink Minnie Mouse pillow. A backpack and a white school shirt hung from a hook.

Above the bed, a strip light was strapped to a wire.

Marie sat up, looking deeply confused and worried. An agent told the children to find something to cover their faces before leading them away to a van.

That was three weeks ago. Marie, whose name has been changed to protect her identity, hasn't seen the children since.

"I feel like I'm dying," she told Foreign Correspondent from an interview room attached to a crowded cell in the National Bureau of Investigation detention centre in the Philippines capital.

Wearing an orange prison T-shirt, she sobbed as she spoke about her three children. It was the first time they had all been apart.

"No-one who is a mother is going to want this – kids not [being] with them," she said.

But Marie has been charged with reprehensible crimes.

As agents from the National Bureau of Investigation took the children away, the investigators combed through items in the bedroom of her home, a two-bedroom rental in a maze of narrow pathways.

They placed phones and sex toys into clear evidence bags.

A female investigator told Marie she was being arrested for violating the anti-trafficking persons act and for child pornography.

She stared at the investigator, then looked at the warrant papers in front of her. "Where do I sign?" she asked.

The facilitators

In 2020, as COVID-19 spread and millions became confined to their homes, reports of online sexual abuse and exploitation of children in the Philippines more than doubled.

Many of the predators are Australians. 

In response, the Philippines government last year declared "war" on the crime and vowed to ramp up efforts to arrest perpetrators and rescue child victims.

But it's complex and often heartbreaking work for the authorities fighting this hidden crime wave.

"It's a really hard crime type, it's oftentimes very grotesque and violent," said Caleb Carroll, a former US police detective who works with the non-government organisation International Justice Mission in Manila.

The crime itself is disturbingly simple.

An offender in another country meets a Filipino "facilitator" online, often on social media or a dating app.

From there, for a price, the facilitator arranges for a child to be sexually abused or exploited live on camera.

English is widely spoken in the Philippines meaning predators can easily communicate with facilitators, and even the children.

"You're talking about sexually motivated offenders getting to basically direct in real time the kind of abuse they want to see," said Caleb Carroll.

Such real-time exchanges can be fiendishly difficult for police to detect. Much of the evidence vanishes as soon as the video call ends.

On the front line

In a pokey office above the dormitory for new recruits at the Philippines National Police, an international task force is helping fight the Philippines' "war" on online child exploitation.

The Philippine Internet Crimes Against Children Center is made up of experts and police from the Philippines, Australia, the UK, the Netherlands and the US.

Its mission is to help local authorities hunt down the facilitators and to locate abused children, often by gathering leads and information from foreign police agencies.

If Australian police arrest an offender or uncover child abuse material involving Filipino children, the task force picks up the trail in the Philippines.

The task force office seems oppressively small for the sheer volume of crimes it is dealing with.

"I think there's a lot more of this crime type happening than we receive referrals about," said Detective Natalie Roesler, one of three Australian Federal Police members on the task force.

"It certainly is just the tip of the iceberg."

Her navy-blue polo shirt sports the Australian and Philippines flags crossed like swords on the sleeve.

"As much as we work together, the reports don't go down," she said.

Before moving to Manila in 2021, Detective Roesler spent a decade working on child sexual abuse cases in Australia and was once named AFP Detective of the Year for her role in bringing down one of the world's worst paedophiles, known as "Waka".

She's exposed to some of the most disturbing and degrading child sexual abuse imaginable.

"There are tough days," Detective Roesler said. "But really, when you think about what the children have been through compared to what we are going through, that keeps you sort of grounded.

"There's a huge sense of urgency because every day children are being abused."

At 7am on a Friday, a flurry of activity swept through the office as investigators assembled to prepare an urgent search warrant application.

At one end of the room, a photograph of a seven-year-old girl, Jolene*, was projected on the wall, her big brown eyes staring expressionless past the camera.

For months, police had been analysing videos of a girl being sexually abused.

They now believed it was Jolene in the videos and that her mother's boyfriend had been the one creating and selling them.

After a lengthy investigation they had tracked him down to a house in Manila, which they now had under surveillance.

Investigators would have to swoop soon or risk him slipping through their fingers.

"These cases are very sensitive," said Colonel Portia Manalad, a senior officer with the Women's and Children's Protection Centre with the Philippines National Police.

"You need to have some patience because everything can change overnight."

With the application in hand, half a dozen investigators piled into a mini-van and sped down a bumpy Manila highway to get it approved in court.

But the judge had already gone to lunch.

When the judge returned, the investigators filed one by one into the closed courtroom to detail the horrific abuse they had seen in the videos.

Outside, stray cats roamed in and out of the waiting room where the other officers working on the case waited for their chance to speak before the judge.

Some had been working on the case for weeks and had toiled late into the night preparing the application.

They dozed as they waited, or spoke amongst themselves about the most chilling aspects of the case, like a video in which the young girl begged for the abuse to stop.

As the minutes and hours ticked by, all feared what it could mean for Jolene.

Fighting the war

In the slick office tower that houses the Australian embassy in Manila's financial district, Detective Roesler sat down at her computer.

A copy of a Skype chat between another woman in the Philippines and a 68-year-old man named Ian Schapel, a retired public servant living in a unit in Adelaide, flashed up on the screen.

It's one of hundreds of chat logs detailing how Schapel negotiated with women in the Philippines to watch children being sexually exploited and abused on live video calls.

In one chat, the facilitator posted a photo of a child in a singlet and shorts.

"I have seen [her] before," Schapel replied. The facilitator insisted the child was "new".

"Let me watch her get undressed," he wrote back, "give me a show".

"Throughout the chats he's very direct about age and it was found that he would direct the shows and the acts," Detective Roesler said.

"He was very manipulative and demanding about what he wanted and would negotiate prices for what he wanted."

The power imbalance between the facilitator and Schapel is stark.

At one point she asked him to send her money without giving him a "show". He accused her of using "the same sob story".

"It is absolutely brutal," said Detective Roesler. "She will end up begging because she wants him just to send some money without having to have a show because she needs to buy food for her children and medicines."

Police first learned of Schapel's depraved crimes when he was stopped by Border Force at Melbourne Airport after returning from an overseas trip in 2020.

They found child sexual abuse material on his phone and, when they searched his house, uncovered over 50,000 images and videos on various devices, including some horrific footage of sexual acts involving children.

He paid as little as $40 to watch the children being abused and exploited. His youngest victim was just three. Schapel received a jail term of 15 years.

Following his arrest, police in Australia passed the evidence to the task force in Manila. From there, Philippines police were able to track down 15 victims and arrest five facilitators.

Examination of the financial records of one of the alleged facilitators led investigators to a 71-year-old man in Western Australia.

They found he paid nearly half a million dollars to sexually abuse children overseas from his home in Geraldton via the internet. He was jailed for 14 years.

Cases where the crimes are live streamed are particularly challenging for investigators.

"Other material that's been pre-recorded and is in possession of offenders, it's easier because they might have that saved on a device," said Detective Roesler.

"But the crime is happening in real time. To go and get that evidence, unless it's been recorded by either party, is quite difficult."

While much of what the police do to catch offenders are "trade secrets", a large part of the AFP's work is monitoring the dark web, keeping track of high-risk and repeat travellers, and looking at suspect financial transactions.

"There's always a trace," she said.

A midnight raid

It was 7pm at the Manila court when the judge granted the search warrant.

The officers left the court for a police station near the suspect's house to rendezvous with the rest of the team set to accompany them on the raid.

There were plain-clothes police and a social worker present, ready to whisk Jolene away to safety.

But rarely are these cases that simple. While many victims are grateful to be found, for others it is more complex.

"Rescue operations are often distressful, especially for very young survivors who may not understand right away why they are being separated from their parents or family members," said Jessa Lazarte, a social worker with the International Justice Mission, who is often first on the scene when children are found.

"The live streaming of child abuse and the online sexual exploitation have been normalised at their home. Because it's the people that they trust, the victims suffer complex trauma."

Often, social welfare authorities determine that non-offending family members are not willing or able to look after the survivors properly.

Many spend the rest of their childhoods in shelters or foster homes, saddled with the complex emotional fallout from being abused by their own parents.

"It's normal that they won't easily trust us," Jessa said. "So it's important that we don't give up on them."

At 10pm, officers gathered for a pre-raid briefing. The suspect had been spotted in the house.

The alley next to the house was so narrow they couldn't get a car down to secure the area in advance, so they would send two cars to the closest entry point and race to the front door.

By the time the cars arrived at the location, it was nearly midnight.

Suddenly, police piled into the street. Neighbours peeked out of their windows.

Investigators stormed the house and found the suspect inside, shirtless.

Detective Roesler stood to the side of the room, quiet and focused, watching as Philippines police retrieved phones and computer hard drives.

It was leads from Australian and Dutch police that led investigators to this point.

The suspect was arrested and charged with multiple crimes. Police allege they found child abuse material on his phone.

"It's disgusting, I can't explain thoroughly," said Lieutenant Colonel Rahul Bolido, of the Philippine National Police, after the raid.

But Jolene was nowhere to be found.

Somewhere in this sprawling city, she is likely with her mother, police believe, who is also suspected of participating in her abuse.

'It's easy money'

Back in the Manila detention centre, Marie pondered her future and her past.

Before police stormed her home, she had been messaging on her phone with what she thought was an overseas man willing to pay for an online sex show of her children.

It was in fact an undercover police officer. As soon as police saw in the video chat the "show" was about to start, they entered the house.

"I'm paying [for] what I did," she said. "That's why I'm here."

But still she tried to justify her actions.

She told me when she lost her job at the start of the pandemic, a friend told her she could make money selling abuse and exploitation videos of her children to foreigners.

She claimed the decision was "painful, not easy".

"I just ate my pride rather than see my kid sleep with an empty stomach," she said.

She said she was the main breadwinner and responsible for supporting not only her kids but also her extended family.

She claimed she only made the children do "shows" towards the end of each month if she didn't have enough money for rent and wasn't doing it for very long.

But in their statements to police, one of the children said they had done so many "shows" in the last three years they had lost count.

According to Cathy Nolasco, head of the National Bureau of Investigation team that arrested Marie, poverty is a driving factor in these times.

"If we go through to the places where we actually conduct these operations, the places are usually, or most often than not, poverty stricken," Ms Nolasco said.

But when the facilitators tell her they had no other choice, she doesn't buy it.

"It's easy money," she said. "We all have options … they should be the one providing for the needs of the children, not the other way around."

Marie is facing life in prison, but even from inside this cage she still hopes for a chance at a different future, one with her kids.

"To [be] normal, forget everything and have a real job as well," she said.

Marie's children are in the care of the Department of Social Welfare. She has no idea where they are and can't contact them.

"If I can just [go] back in time, I wouldn't do it. I wouldn't," she said. "No-one [is] going to regret it first, always at the end. I know people going to hate me. I'm just human. I'm not perfect."

As our time drew to an end, I said to Marie that I found it difficult, as a mother, to understand how she could do this to her children.

"Maybe because we are not the same," she replied. "That's why you do not understand. What we've been through to stay alive. Maybe when you in my situation, we're the same. For sure, you are going to understand me."

At the task force office, investigators are still looking for seven-year-old Jolene.

They have been scouring the suspect's data and financial records to see if they can identify any other foreign offenders who could lead to more arrests.

"The really hard thing is that you leave work every day, you go to bed every night knowing there are still more children out there that you know about," said task force policing expert Caleb Carroll.

"And it's heartbreaking because they may not know that anybody's even out there looking for them, even though we're trying."

Watch Foreign Correspondent's 'Saving the Children' on ABC iview or YouTube .

*Name has been changed to protect the child's identity.

• X (formerly Twitter)
• Child Sexual Abuse
• Cyber Crime
• Philippines

Mercer Your Local News for Mercer County, New Jersey

Ekta Dwarkesh Child Abuse

Three students at a preschool in Mercer County were hit and grabbed aggressively by a childcare teacher, authorities said.

The Malvern School.

In one of the incidents at the Malvern School on Route 33 in Robbinsville, the teacher's slap caused a nosebleed, according to an affidavit of probable cause obtained by Daily Voice. Another incident caused a visible injury to an arm, the paperwork says.

Ekta Dwarkesh, 45, of South Brunswick, is charged with three counts of endangering the welfare of a child by abuse or neglect, according to the Mercer County Prosecutor's Office.

Surveillance video from the school showed Dwarkesh assaulting two children, and investigators interviewed the three children at the prosecutor’s office.

The Malvern School said preschool officials learned of the alleged incidents on March 20 and ultimately fired Dwarkesh.

"The safety and well-being of every child entrusted to us is, and always will be, our highest priority," the school said in a statement to Daily Voice. "We hold all of our teachers to very high standards and have a zero-tolerance policy regarding any behavior that doesn’t reflect the care and compassion that The Malvern School has stood for since it was founded more than 25 years ago."

"The action taken by this individual is not only prohibited, but it also goes completely against the values of our dedicated and caring team," the school said. "We remain committed to providing a safe and nurturing environment for our children, families, and staff through strict safeguarding protocols."

The Malvern School operates 27 schools in New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

Click here to follow Daily Voice Mercer and receive free news updates.

SCROLL TO NEXT ARTICLE

• River City Live
• Newsletters

WEATHER ALERT

2 river flood warnings in effect for Brantley and Columbia Counties

A trial is underway for the panama papers, a case that changed the country's financial rules.

Juan Zamorano

Associated Press

Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved

The Supreme Court stands in Panama City, Monday, April 8, 2024 as the trial starts for those charged in connection with the worldwide Panama Papers money laundering case. (AP Photo/Agustin Herrera)

PANAMA CITY – Eight years after 11 million leaked secret financial documents revealed how some of the world’s richest people hide their wealth, more than two dozen defendants are on trial in Panama for their alleged roles.

The repercussions of the leaks were far-ranging, prompting the resignation of the prime minister of Iceland and bringing scrutiny to the then-leaders of Argentina and Ukraine, Chinese politicians and Russian President Vladimir Putin, among others.

Recommended Videos

But those on trial now for alleged money laundering are principally the leaders and associates of the now defunct Panamanian boutique law firm that helped set up the shell companies used to obscure those really behind them.

The leaders of that firm, Jürgen Mossack and Ramón Fonseca, are among those on trial.

WHAT IS THE PANAMA PAPERS CASE ABOUT?

Panamanian prosecutors allege that Mossack, Fonseca and their associates created a web of offshore companies that used complex transactions to hide money linked to illicit activities in the “car wash” corruption scandal of Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht.

In December 2016, Odebrecht pleaded guilty in U.S. federal court to a charge related to its use of shell companies to disguise hundreds of millions of dollars in bribes paid in countries around the world to win public contracts.

According to Panamanian prosecutors, the Mossack Fonseca firm created 44 shell companies, 31 of which opened accounts in Panama to hide money linked to the Brazilian scandal. The judge on the case, Baloisa Marquínez, last year decided to also merge the Odebrecht-related charges to prosecutors’ allegations about the firm’s work for German giant Siemens. Prosecutors allege a former executive with the company used entities created by Mossack Fonseca to transfer funds for bribes.

A Siemens spokesperson declined to comment, noting that it is not a party to the Panama case and that it involves former Siemens employees in their private capacity.

WHAT DO MOSSACK AND FONSECA SAY?

The 71-year-old Fonseca has not been present for the trial, because his lawyer said he is hospitalized. But he had previously said his firm did not control how their clients used the shell companies the firm created for them. Its role was simply the creation and sale of the companies.

Mossack, a 76-year-old lawyer originally from Germany, said in a statement to The Associated Press that “we categorically reject that we have committed any crime, not Mossack Fonseca nor the subsidiaries … and we hope that can be proved in the trial. If there is in fact justice in our case, they have to absolve us.”

Both men were arrested in 2017, but had awaited trial out on bond.

WHAT HAPPENED TO THE FIRM?

Mossack Fonseca helped create and sell around 240,000 shell companies across four decades in business. It announced its closure in March 2018, two years after the scandal erupted.

“The reputational deterioration, the media campaign, the financial siege and the irregular actions of some Panamanian authorities have caused irreparable damage, whose consequence is the complete cease of operations to the public,” the firm said in a statement at the time.

HOW DID THE SCANDAL AFFECT PANAMA?

Panama’s international reputation for financial services was tarnished by the scandal.

The European Union included Panama on a list of tax haven countries — low taxes or fiscal opacity — which led international financial institutions to demand the implementation of measures that would allow scrutiny of the banking and financial systems.

Consequently, the country’s business creating shell companies plummeted some 40% within a year of the scandal.

WHAT CHANGES DID PANAMA MAKE?

Panama’s government implemented changes to make it possible to identify the ultimate beneficiary behind limited liability companies and their assets.

Changes also sought to give greater responsibility to the registered agents — typically lawyers from Panamanian firms — listed for the shell companies.

The objective was to make it possible for Panamanian authorities to respond to requests to assist in investigations.

Julio Aguirre, an expert and financial specialist in Panama, said the government wants the registered agents to actually keep an eye on the companies. Before, “the law didn’t ask them to follow up, there wasn’t that legal obligation,” he said.

Banks had also previously been restricted in their ability to know who was really behind accounts. “They gave the bank the vehicle to obtain that information,” Aguirre said.

Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

Click here to take a moment and familiarize yourself with our Community Guidelines.