The “perfect whoever”. Notes and reflections above the concept of paedophilia in the field of forensic psychiatry: between myth and reality

Abstract

The authors question the common idea that a paedophile is affected by a severe psychiatric problem or personality disorder, underlying instead a different evidence. In the vast majority of cases an individual indicted for  sexual abuse on minors does not show any pathological personality profile in strict terms, appearing as a “perfect whoever”, as mentioned in the title of this paper. If in our penal code the category of paedophilia is summarized by a specific behaviour, i.e. engaging in sexual actions with a child under fourteen (under sixteen in specific cases), in the field of psychopathology we do not have such a strict and unequivocal definition. While we ascertain the presence of a paedophilic behaviour in an individual we can not predict which kind of personality traits characterizes this individual and,more importantly, if he is affected at all by any psychiatric disturbance relevant in the forensic field. Our experience, supported by international literature, is that such a disturbance is not ordinarily present except in rare cases of major psychoses, mental retardation or severe personality disorders with marked sadistic or antisocial traits. The authors stress also another important topic. In their view the paedophilic behaviour is not exclusively a sexual crime at all, even though sexuality is involved. In the vast majority of cases an indicted individual is a relevant figure in the emotional sphere of the child,belonging to his parental or social environment. So, this criminal behaviour is, in the authors’ opinion, related instead to the psychological situation connected to cases of circumventions of an incapable. Thus it finds its determinants in the relation between the child victim and the adult, who manipulates him/her in order to exploit his dominant role. In this situation the paedophile creates an aura of confidence and dependence in which sexual behaviour is just a tool to reach his goal of creating an atmosphere of intimacy and proximity with the child victim, alluring and enticing him in a special and exclusive relationship. What happens is that the child requests affective intimacy to the adult while the latter deliberately misinterprets this need through a manipulative use of his sexual behaviour as a goal to strengthen and mark this intimacy. This set of “sexual” actions leads to a subsequent strengthening of relation between the child and the paedophile, though of a distorted kind,with an improper use of sexuality (very often completely different from the adult sexuality which  the paedophile exercises in a complete form with his adult partner – wife, fiancé, girlfriend, etc.). One more point is the fact that at present times paedophilic behaviour is generally confined to male sex. The authors do not have an answer to this specificity, even though they try to put forward some hypotheses. One of these, taking into account an historical and a psychodynamic perspective, suggests that a male individual may feel a sort of repressed longing, compared to the female role, for the education and rearing of a child. This repressed need is enacted through the exercise of sexual power on the child victim,so that the paedophile is nevertheless able to impress his mark,deep and indelible, on the child exercising his criminal behaviour.