Outcomes of sexual abuse on self-esteem among adolescents: A systematic review
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The burden of sexual abuse remains a global reality and it is known to affect
adolescents’ psycho-social well-being. The current study aimed at determining the
unanimity findings on the relationship between sexual abuse and self-esteem among
adolescents as well as the concomitant determinants of self-esteem among sexually
abused adolescents. To achieve this, a systematic search of PubMed, Science Direct,
Cochrane, African Journals Online (AJOL) and Google Scholar was conducted to
identify studies that focused on the outcomes of sexual abuse on the self-esteem of
adolescents. Based on this, a simple synthesis of basic findings of the selected studies
was conducted. A total of 7,278 studies were identified out of which only eight studies
from Africa, Asia, Europe and North America met the selection criteria. With three
research questions guiding the study, findings reveal that sexual abuse is prevalent
among the study participants. It also revealed an inverse relationship between sexual
abuse and self-esteem among he adolescents. Furthermore, three categories of codeterminants
of self-esteem among sexually abused adolescents were observed
namely socio-demographic determinants; parental and family determinants as well as
nature of abuse. The overriding deduction from these studies is that sexual abuse
impacts negatively on the self-esteem of adolescents. These findings have implications
for Sustainable Development Goals. Since this study has established that sexual abuse
impacts negatively on the self-esteem of adolescents, drivers of SGD 3 should, among
other things, intensify campaigns against adolescents’ sexual abuse and make
psychological intervention by counselling psychologists, available to victims. © 2020
The Author(s). This open access article is distributed under a Creative Commons
Keywords
BF Psychology