Abstract

This study is to show sexual abuse prevalence, sexual abuse type, sexual abused related variables and adaptation, and relationships between self-esteem, family function, social support and adaptation among female adolescents in juvenile training school. This study was conducted on 119 female adolescents who are in a juvenile training school in Kyung-gi province. It was done with five scales ; K-YSR, sexual abuse experience scale, self-esteem, family environment scale and social support scale. The followings are the main results of this study. First, 70.9% of female adolescents in the juvenile detention home suffered sexual abuse, and the more severe the level of abuse was by a large number and for a longer time it had happened several times. Second, after dividing the respondents in three groups according to the extent of the abuse, it showed that the rape victims or victims who had nearly been raped showed more psychological and behavior problems than the ones who suffered from a minor level of sexual abuse. Third, respondents with a high level in self-esteem, family function and social support showed a lower level in psychological and behavior problems despite the fact that they had suffered from sexual abuse. Fourth, on showing the adaptation level of sexually abused adolescents the most accurate prediction was the level of self-esteem. This study shows that although sexually abused adolescents have more adaptation problems than the non-sexually abused adolescents, self-esteem, family function and social support give a positive influences to their adaptation. The significance and the limits of this study and suggestions for further studies are presented.