The Motivation-Facilitation Model of Sexual Offending

“Research suggests that some individuals who engage in compulsive pornography use or hypersexual behavior experience tolerance effects, where they seek out increasingly novel or taboo material (Seto 2019).”

“Rather, the combination of sadistic preferences with reduced self-control might be necessary for sadistic sexual offenses to occur 34 .”

“Third, we subsumed nepiophilia, pedophilia, and hebephilia under the term pe-dophilia (either exclusive or non-exclusive) and ephebophilia, teleiophilia, mesophilia, and gerontophilia as no pedophilia (Seto, 2017).”

“As pedophilia has been shown to be a primary motivator for some individuals who commit sexual offenses against children (Seto, 2019) and strongly linked to sexual re-offending, the identification and development of methods that may weaken sexual preference for children could potentially reduce the risk of sexual offen…”

“…of child sex offending are diverse and range from psychological and psychosocial scholarship on the characteristics and motivations of perpetrators (Seto, 2019), rational choice and routine activity theories focused on the contexts of child sex offending (Brown, 2022), sociological analyses of the…”

“In addition, we wanted to test whether the MFM (Seto, 2019), which has been based on fi ndings from (largely offending) male samples, explains the propensity for criminally relevant deviant sexual behavior (e.g., rape, child sexual abuse) within the general population.”

“The sexual interest in pre-pubescent children alone does not necessarily result in CSA, but when coupled with impulsive, risk-taking tendencies and a lack of self-control, CSA becomes more likely (Seto, 2019).”

“Although in intrafamilial CSA offenders substitute a child for an adult sexual partner, the offenders often maintain their adult sexual relationships [31, 32].”

“This model suggests that paraphilia, high sex drive, and intense mating effort are each important motivations for online and offline sexual offenses (Seto, 2019).”

“We hypothesize that individuals convicted of sex offenses who specialize in that type of behavior may be particularly motivated to do so (e.g., based on certain paraphilias; Seto, 2019) or they have certain clinical factors (e.”

“, negative attitudes toward authority, psychopathy) and sex crime specific criminality (e.g., deviant sexual interests, emotional identification with children; Brouillette-Alarie et al., 2016; Hanson & Morton-Bourgon, 2005; Quinsey, 1986; Seto, 2019).”

“Atypical sexuality concerns the existence of paraphilias (Seto, 2019), being pedophilic disorder the most frequent among ISOCs (Arbanas et al., 2022).”

“…focus may be applied to individuals who are in regular contact with children and thus have greater opportunity to offend (see Lanning, 2010; Seto, 2019) or those who are more likely to have a past or concurrent contact sexual offense (e.g., see Long et al., 2016, regarding the Kent…”

“According to Seto (2019), primary sexual motivations for sexually boundary-violating behavior lie in a high sex drive, intense efforts to find a sexual partner, and para-philic disorders.”

“These values are below estimates that 20% – 50% of men who have sexually offended against children meet criteria for pedophilic disorder (Gerwinn et al., 2018; Schmidt et al., 2013; Seto, 2009, 2018, 2019; Walker & Pan fi l, 2016).”

“Situational factors (i.e. opportunities to offend) also impact one’s likelihood to commit a sexual offence (Seto, 2019).”

“…with demographic factors (e.g., age, gender, and ethnicity; Babchishin et al., 2016), antisocial orientation (Babchishin et al., 2016; Hanson & Morton-Bourgon, 2005; Katsiyannis et al., 2018), and sexual deviancy (Babchishin et al., 2016; Hanson et al., 2010; Ogloff et al., 2012; Seto, 2019).”

“ECWC predicts both the onset (e.g., McPhail et al., 2013; Konrad et al., 2018) and maintenance (Mann et al., 2010; McPhail et al., 2013) of sexual offending, and it is an important factor in many theories of sexual offending (e.g., Finkelhor, 1984; Seto, 2019; Ward & Beech, 2006).”

“This requires further investigation and is particularly important when considering that deviant sexual arousal is a predictor of recidivism (Hanson & Morton-Bourgon, 2005) and pedophilia a key motivating factor in sexual offending and re-offending against children (Seto, 2019).”

“Inability to control problematic sexual behaviours is a serious health concern reflected in the inclusion of Compulsive Sexual Behaviour Disorder (CSBD) – an impulse control disorder characterised by a persistent inability to control intense and repetitive sexual impulses or urges, resulting in recurring sexual behavi…”

“Gemäß des Motivation-Facilitation Model von Seto (2017) lässt sich die Begehung von Sexualstraftaten (wie z.B. DSKM-Nutzung) wie folgt erklären: Es müssen bestimmte motivationale und auslösende Faktoren vorliegen, welche unter bestimmten situativen Bedingungen die Wahrscheinlichkeit der Begehung…”

“People with paraphilias and antisocial behaviors are considered the riskiest group in terms of perpetrating sexual offenses (Seto, 2019).”

“…with some sexual offences and sexual recidivism; in fact, research has shown that para-philic arousal is one of the strongest predictors of sexual reoffending (Akerman & Beech, 2012; Hanson & Bussière, 1998; Hanson & Morton-Bourgon, 2005; Mann et al., 2010; Seto, 2019; Seto et al., 2023).”

“One important contributing factor to the sexual abuse of a child, identified both in etiological models and in research on the risk factors for sexual recidivism, is a lack of self-control or a failure to control one’s behavior (e.g., Hanson & Morton-Bourgon, 2005; Seto, 2019; Ward, Hudson, & Keenan, 1998).”

“The motivation–facilitation model postulates that sexual offending is more likely to occur as a result of atypical motivations (e.g., paraphilia, hypersexuality) combined with trait (e.g., antisocial personality) and state (e.g., alcohol use) factors that facilitate offending (Seto, 2008, 2019).”

“Thus, beyond favorable individual predispositions for sexual offending, a motivated individual requires a favorable environment or opportunity to act on them (Seto, 2019).”

“Antisociality refers to propensity to engage in antisocial behavior, for instance typified by impulsivity, a willingness to cross social and legal boundaries, and risk taking (Seto, 2017).”

“Over the past three decades, several psychologically-informed theories of male sexual o ff ending have been developed and well validated (e.g. Buss & Malamuth, 1996; Marshall & Barbaree, 1990; Seto, 2019; Stinson et al., 2008; Ward & Beech, 2006).”

“Seto (2019) suggests that pedophilia is a motivating factor towards offending, but that this alone will not dictate offending without additional facilitating factors, which overcome inhibitions to offend.”

“Finally, our study did not examine underlying sexual motivations to risk factors of sexual offending in clergy (Seto, 2019), which would shed additional light on nuanced assessment practices that could identify different factors that explain risk to sexual offending.”

“Building on Finkelhor ’ s preconditions model (Finkelhor, 1984) and the general theory of crimes (Gottfredson & Hirschi, 1990), Seto developed the Motivation-Facilitation Model of sexual offending (MFM) (e.g. Seto, 2019).”

“This low rate is consistent with the characterisation of CSEM offenders as having fewer antisocial ten-dencies than offenders who commit both online and offline offences (Seto, 2019).”

“Paraphilic interests may contribute to the risk of sexual offending (Seto, 2019) and have been established as a major risk factor for sexual recidivism (Mann et al., 2010; Stephens et al., 2017).”

“Seto (2019) proposes that trait and state factors have both the potential to increase and decrease the risk of sexual offending.”

“In line with previous approaches (Allen et al., 2022; Seto, 2019), items describing scenarios from a second-person perspective were generated by the authors.”

“A chronophilia is a distinct type of sexual attraction pattern that varies as a function of the ages of preferred sexual targets (Seto, 2017).”

“From this perspective, the findings concerning general personality features in CSOs agree with theories of sexual offending and research on recidivism that emphasise the role of disinhibition in the development and maintenance of sexual offending behaviour (e.g. Hanson & Morton-Bourgon, 2005; Seto, 2019).”

“Because paraphilias are key motivations for sexual offenses (Seto, 2017), Lehmann and colleagues (2014) also included behavioral indicators of pedophilia and sexual sadism to increase the content validity of the expected themes.”

“…has reliably demonstrated that individuals commit child sex abuse for many reasons, exclusive of pedophilic interest, such as antisociality, substance abuse, lack of age-appropriate peers, alleviating negative emotional states, etc., (Mann & Hollin, 2007; Seto, 2008, 2019; Tenbergen et al., 2015).”

“Sexual offending has long been linked to both general criminality and sex crime–specific factors, such as deviant sexual interests and paraphilias (Hanson & Bussière, 1998; Lussier et al., 2005; Seto, 2019).”

“…arousal, such as hypersexual behavior and sexual preoccupation, have long been implicated in both first-time sexual offending (Finkelhor, 1984; Seto, 2019; Ward & Beech, 2017) and recidivism among men with sexual convictions (Hanson & Harris, 2000; Hanson & Morton-Bourgon, 2004; Hanson et…”

“Likewise, the Motivation Facilitation Model (Seto, 2019) incorporates paraphilias (abnormal sexual desires) as a motivation for sexual offending, whereas this study shows again that up to a 2-year age gap was generally accepted, where measures involved such deviant and normal sexual desires.”

“Factors like substance use may be particularly important in cases of elective SECTT because substance use lowers inhibitions to engage in in illegal sexual behavior (e.g., Panko & George, 2012; Seto, 2019).”

“Paraphilic sexual motivations and criminality are recognised as important in most theories of sexual offending, including themotivation facilitation model of sexual offending (Seto, 2017).”

“…motivations (e.g., paraphilias, high sex drive, intense mating effort) energize behavior, while trait and state facilitators (e.g., antisociality, self-regulation problems, intoxication, negative affect) and situational opportunity determine whether that motivation is acted upon (Seto, 2019).”

“Although these speci fi c constructs are often emphasized, there are other related constructs that arguably fall into this domain (e.g., intense mating effort; Seto, 2019).”

“Sexuelle Grenzverletzungen Es ist grundlegend zwischen sexuellen Fantasien, die sexuelle Grenzverletzungen betreffen, und aktiv begangenen sexuellen Grenzverletzungen zu unterscheiden (Seto 2019).”

“As outlined by the Motivation-Facilitation Model (Seto, 2019), an offence-related paraphilic interest or fantasy can provide the motivation to offend, which is likely to occur if certain state or trait facilitatory factors are present (e.g., antisocial traits, offence-supportive cognitions, self-regulation problems, a…”

“As defined by Seto (2019), motivation is a “psychological process that energizes and directs behavior” (p. 5) Motives can be both unconscious (e.g., an implicit belief) or explicitly conscious-one in which the individual is self-aware (Zurbriggen, 2000).”

“While attraction to children could certainly be a motivator for sexual offending (Seto, 2017), and ex-clusivity can be a predictor of recidivism in people who have already committed a sexual offense (Eher et al., 2015), there has been no research on whether there are a set of factors associated…”

“Another theory along the same lines, the motivation–facilitation model [5,20], explains the role that inhibitory control plays in the strong motivation that may appear in the presence of pedophilia.”

“Education Provider Responses to HSB Are Experienced as Oppressive and Risk-Averse.”

“…paraphilias, high sex drive, and intense mating effort (taken together as sexual deviance), combined with personality factors such as antisociality and aggression, and situational factors such as alcohol or negative affect, can motivate an individual to commit a first-time sexual offence (2019).”

“The shared inhibitory de fi cits observed in both CSO and P+CSO groups support the motivation-facilitation model of sexual offending proposed by Seto (103), which posits that sexual offenses occur when self-regulation mechanisms fail to suppress inappropriate sexual desires, independently of the target of said desires.”

“The motivation-facilitation model of sexual offending (MFM; Seto, 2019) posits that motivating factors create the intention or desire to engage in sexual offending, while facilitating factors increase the likelihood that these motivated behaviors will indeed be carried out (Pullman et al., 2016).”