Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-x5gtn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-30T17:58:49.174Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Online Child Sexual Grooming Discourse

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 September 2023

Nuria Lorenzo-Dus
Affiliation:
Swansea University
Craig Evans
Affiliation:
Swansea University
Ruth Mullineux-Morgan
Affiliation:
Swansea University

Summary

This Element examines technology-assisted grooming of children for sex – henceforth, online grooming – as an illegal practice of communicative manipulation and, as such, something that research within the academic field of forensic linguistics is ideally placed to help counter. The analysis draws upon online grooming datasets of different sizes and provenance, including from law enforcement, and deploys different analytic techniques from primarily discourse analysis. Three features of online grooming discourse are focussed on: groomers' use of manipulation tactics; groomers' abuse of power asymmetries; and children's communication during online grooming. The Element also discusses ways in which findings derived from richly contextualised analysis of online grooming discourse can – when combined with co-creation projects involving child-safeguarding groups, children and lived-experience experts – add considerable value to societal efforts to counter online grooming and other forms of online child sexual exploitation and abuse.
Get access
Type
Element
Information
Online ISBN: 9781009314626
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication: 19 October 2023

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Addawood, A., Badawy, A., Lerman, K. & Ferrara, E. (2019). Linguistic cues to deception: Identifying political trolls on social media. Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Web and Social Media, ICWSM 2019 (June), Washington DC: Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), 1525.Google Scholar
Allan, K. (1997). Speech act theory: Overview. In Lamarque, P. & Asher, R. (Eds.), Concise encyclopedia of philosophy of language (pp. 454–66). Oxford: Pergamon.Google Scholar
Androutsopoulos, J. (2014). Languaging when contexts collapse: Audience design in social networking. Discourse, Context & Media, 4 –5, 6273.Google Scholar
Austin, J. L. (1962). How to do things with words. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Bachenko, J., Fitzpatrick, E. & Schonwetter, M. (2008). Verification and implementation of language-based deception indicators in civil and criminal narratives. Coling 2008 – 22nd International Conference on Computational Linguistics, Proceedings of the Conference, 1 (August), Stroudsburg, PA: Association for Computational Linguistics, 41–8.Google Scholar
Baker, P. (2006). Using corpora in discourse analysis. London: Bloomsbury.Google Scholar
Bakir, V., Herring, E., Miller, D. & Robinson, P. (2019). Organized persuasive communication: A new conceptual framework for research on public relations, propaganda and promotional culture. Critical Sociology, 45(3), 311–28.Google Scholar
Barendt, E. (2009). Incitement to, and glorification of, terrorism. In Hare, I. & Weinstein, J. (Eds.), Extreme speech and democracy (pp. 445–62). Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Beckett, H. (2019). Moving beyond discourses of agency, gain and blame: Reconceptualising young people’s experiences of sexual exploitation. In Pearce, J. (Ed.), Child sexual exploitation: Why theory matters (pp. 2342). Bristol: Bristol University Press.Google Scholar
Benwell, B. & Stokoe, E. (2006). Discourse and identity. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.Google Scholar
Blum-Kulka, S., House, J. & Kasper, G. (1989). Cross-cultural pragmatics: Requests and apologies. In Blum-Kulka, S., House, J. & Kasper, G. (Eds.), The CCSARP coding manual: Cross-cultural pragmatics – Requests and apologies (pp. 273–94). London: Ablex.Google Scholar
Bolander, B. & Locher, M. (2020). Beyond the online offline distinction: Entry points to digital discourse. Discourse, Context & Media, 3, 426.Google Scholar
Brown, P. & Levinson, S. C. (1978/1987). Politeness: Some universals in language usage. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Chiang, E. & Grant, T. (2017). Online grooming: Moves and strategies. Language and Law / Linguagem e Direito, 4(1), 103–41.Google Scholar
Chiang, E. & Grant, T. (2019). Deceptive identity performance: Offender moves and multiple identities in online child abuse conversations. Applied Linguistics, 40(4), 675–98.Google Scholar
Chibnall, S., Wallace, M., Leicht, C. & Lunghofer, L. (2006). I-safe evaluation. Final report. www.ojp.gov/library/publications/i-safe-evaluation-final-reportGoogle Scholar
Christie, N. (1986). The ideal victim. In Fattah, E. A. (Ed.), From crime policy to victim policy. London: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Coupland, J. & Coupland, N. (2009). Attributing stance in discourses of body shape and weight loss. In Jaffe, A. (Ed.), Stance: Sociolinguistic perspectives (pp. 227–49). Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Culpeper, J. (2011). Impoliteness: Using language to cause offence. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Davidson, J., DeMarco, J., Bifulco, A., Bogaerts, S. & Caretti, V. (2016). Enhancing police and industry practice. EU Child Online Safety Project. London: Middlesex University.Google Scholar
Davidson, J., Martellozzo, E. & Lorenz, M. (2009). Evaluation of CEOP ThinkUKnow internet safety programme and exploration of young people’s internet safety knowledge. London: Kingston University.Google Scholar
Davis, D. H. & Sinnreich, A. (2020). Beyond fact-checking: Lexical patterns as lie detectors in Donald Trump’s tweets. International Journal of Communication, 14, 5237–60.Google Scholar
de Fina, A., Schiffrin, D. & Bamberg, M. (2006). Discourse and identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
De Hart, D., Dwyer, G., Seto, M. C., et al. (2017). Internet sexual solicitation of children: A proposed typology of offenders based on their chats, e-mails, and social network posts. Journal of Sexual Aggression, 23(1), 7789.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dodsworth, J. (2022). Child sexual exploitation, victim blaming or rescuing: Negotiating a feminist perspective on the way forward. In Cocker, C. & Hafford-Letchield, T. (Eds.), Rethinking feminist theories for social work practice (pp. 287302). Cham: Springer International Publishing.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Egan, V., Hoskinson, J. & Shewan, D. (2011). Perverted justice: A content analysis of the language used by offenders detected attempting to solicit children for sex. Antisocial Behavior: Causes, Correlations and Treatments, 20(3), 273–97.Google Scholar
Elliott, I. A. & Beech, A. R. (2009). Understanding online child pornography use: Applying sexual offense theory to internet offenders. Aggression and Violent Behavior, 14(3), 180–93.Google Scholar
Ende, M. (1979). The neverending story. New York: Firebird.Google Scholar
Evans, C. & Lorenzo-Dus, N. (2022). Keywords in online grooming: A corpus-assisted discourse study. 10th International Symposium on Intercultural, Cognitive and Social Pragmatics (EPICS X), 23–25 May, Seville, Spain.Google Scholar
Finkelhor, D., Turner, H., Ormrod, R. & Hamby, S. L. (2009). Violence, abuse, and crime exposure in a national sample of children and youth. Pediatrics, 124(5), 1411–23.Google Scholar
Gottschalk, P. (2011). A dark side of computing and information sciences: Characteristics of online groomers. Journal of Emerging Trends in Computing and Information Sciences, 2(9), 447–55. www.cisjournal.orgGoogle Scholar
Grant, T. & Macleod, N. (2016). Assuming identities online: Experimental linguistics applied to the policing of online paedophile activity. Applied Linguistics, 37(1), 5070.Google Scholar
Grant, T. & Macleod, N. (2020). Language and online identities: The undercover policing of internet sexual crime. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Hallett, S. (2016). ‘An uncomfortable comfortableness’: ‘Care’, child protection and child sexual exploitation. British Journal of Social Work, 46(7), 2137–52.Google Scholar
Hallett, S. (2017). Making sense of child sexual exploitation: Exchange, abuse and young people. London: Policy Press.Google Scholar
Halliday, M. (1978). Language as social semiotic. The social interpretation of language and meaning. London: Edward Arnold.Google Scholar
Halliday, M. (1994). An introduction to functional grammar (2nd edition). London: Edward Arnold.Google Scholar
Hamilton-Giachritsis, C., Hanson, E., Whittle, H. & Beech, A. (2017). Everyone deserves to be happy and safe. A mixed methods study exploring how online and offline child sexual abuse impact young people and how professionals respond to it. https://learning.nspcc.org.uk/research-resources/2017/impact-online-offline-child-sexual-abuseGoogle Scholar
Hamilton-Giachritsis, C. E., Hanson, E., Whittle, H. C., Alves-Costa, F. & Beech, A. R. (2020). Technology assisted child sexual abuse in the UK: Young people’s views on the impact of online sexual abuse. Children and Youth Services Review, 119, 110.Google Scholar
Hamilton-Giachritsis, C. E., Hanson, E., Whittle, H. C., et al. (2021). Technology assisted child sexual abuse: Professionals’ perceptions of risk and impact on children and young people. Child Abuse & Neglect, 119, 112.Google Scholar
Hanson, E. (2019). Understanding online forces and dynamics. In Pearce, J. (Ed.), Child sexual exploitation: Why theory matters (pp. 87116). Bristol: Bristol University Press.Google Scholar
Hanson, E. & Holmes, D. (2014). That difficult age: Developing a more effective response to risks in adolescence. Dartington: Research in Practice.Google Scholar
Hardie, A. (2012). CQPweb: Combining power, flexibility and usability in a corpus analysis tool. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics, 17(3), 380409.Google Scholar
Herring, S. C. (2013). Discourse in Web 2.0: Familiar, reconfigured, and emergent. Discourse, 2(0), 126.Google Scholar
Holmes, J. (1995). Women, men and politeness. Harlow: Longman.Google Scholar
Hymes, D. (1974). Foundations in sociolinguistics: An ethnographic approach. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.Google Scholar
Inches, G. & Crestani, F. (2012). Overview of the International Sexual Predator Identification Competition at PAN-2012. Proceedings of the PAN 2012 Lab Uncovering Plagiarism, Authorship, and Social Software Misuse (within CLEF 2012), 30.Google Scholar
Jakobson, R. (1960). Closing statements: Linguistics and poetics. In Innis, R. (Ed.), Semiotics: An introductory anthology (pp. 145–75). Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Jakobson, R. (1985). Poetry of grammar and grammar of poetry. In Verbal art, verbal sign, verbal time (pp. 3746). Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Jay, A. (2014). Independent inquiry into child sexual exploitation in Rotherham, 1997–2013. Rotherham: Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council.Google Scholar
Joleby, M., Landström, S., Lunde, C. & Jonsson, L. S. (2021). Experiences and psychological health among children exposed to online child sexual abuse: A mixed methods study of court verdicts. Psychology, Crime and Law, 27(2), 159–81.Google Scholar
Jones, R. (2004). The problem of context in computer-mediated communication. In Levine, P. & Scollon, R. (Eds.), Discourse and technology: Multimodal discourse analysis (pp. 2033). Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.Google Scholar
Jones, R. (2012). Discourse analysis. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Kidron, B., Evans, A., Afia, J., et al. (2018). Disrupted childhood: The cost of persuasive design. London: 5Rights.Google Scholar
Kloess, J. A., Hamilton-Giachritsis, C. E. & Beech, A. R. (2017). A descriptive account of victims’ behaviour and responses in sexually exploitative interactions with offenders. Psychology, Crime and Law, 23(7), 621–32.Google Scholar
Kontostathis, A., Edwards, L., Bayzick, J., Leatherman, A. & Moore, K. (2009). Comparison of rule-based to human analysis of chat logs. Communication Theory, 8(2), 112.Google Scholar
Kopecký, K. (2017). Online blackmail of Czech children focused on so-called ‘sextortion’ (analysis of culprit and victim behaviors). Telematics and Informatics, 34(1), 1119.Google Scholar
Kopecký, K., Hejsek, L., Jana, K., Marešová, H. & Řeřichová, V. (2015). Specifics of children communication and online aggressors within the online assaults on children (analysis of selected utterances). SGEM 2015 International Multidisciplinary Scientific Conferences on Social Sciences and Arts, 195202.Google Scholar
Kurzon, D. (1998). Discourse of silence. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing.Google Scholar
Lalor, K. & McElvaney, R. (2010). Child sexual abuse, links to later sexual exploitation/high-risk sexual behavior, and prevention/treatment programs. Trauma, Violence, & Abuse, 11(4), 159–77.Google Scholar
Lee, H.-E., Ermakova, T., Ververis, V. & Fabian, B. (2020). Detecting child sexual abuse material: A comprehensive survey. Forensic Science International: Digital Investigation, 34, 301022.Google Scholar
Leech, G. N. (1983). Principles of pragmatics. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Levinson, S. C. (1979). Activity types and language. Linguistics, 17(5–6), 365400.Google Scholar
Locher, M. A. & Watts, R. J. (2008). Relational work and impoliteness: Negotiating norms of linguistic behaviour. Language Power and Social Process, 21, 77100.Google Scholar
Lorenzo-Dus, N. (2021). ‘It’s the subtle language that gets to you’: Understanding and managing researcher exposure to online child sexual grooming content. 8th annual BAAL Language and New Media SIG Event: Focus on the researcher – Dealing with distressing data. York: British Association for Applied Linguistics.Google Scholar
Lorenzo-Dus, N. (2023). Digital grooming: Discourses of manipulation and cyber-crime. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Lorenzo-Dus, N. & Kinzel, A. (2021). ‘We’ll watch TV and do other stuff’: A corpus-assisted discourse study of vague language in child sexual grooming. In Fuster, M. et al. (Eds.), Exploring discourse and ideology through corpora (pp. 189211). New York: Peter Lang.Google Scholar
Lorenzo-Dus, N. & Izura, C. (2017). ‘cause ur special’: Understanding trust and complimenting behaviour in online grooming discourse. Journal of Pragmatics, 112, 6882.Google Scholar
Lorenzo-Dus, N., Izura, C. & Pérez-Tattam, R. R. (2016). Understanding grooming discourse in computer-mediated environments. Discourse, Context and Media, 12, 4050.Google Scholar
Lorenzo-Dus, N. & Kinzel, A. (2019). ‘So is your mom as cute as you?’: Examining patterns of language use by online sexual groomers. Journal of Corpora and Discourse Studies, 2, 1439.Google Scholar
Lorenzo-Dus, N., Kinzel, A. & di Cristofaro, M. (2020). The communicative modus operandi of online child sexual groomers: Recurring patterns in their language use. Journal of Pragmatics, 155, 1527.Google Scholar
Macdonald, S. & Lorenzo-Dus, N. (2021). Intentional and performative persuasion: The linguistic basis for criminalizing the (direct and indirect) encouragement of terrorism. Criminal Law Forum, 31(4), 473512.Google Scholar
Martellozzo, E. (2013). Online child sexual abuse: Grooming, policing and child protection in a multi-media world. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Melrose, M. (2010). What’s love got to do with it: Theorising young people’s involvement in prostitution. Youth and Policy, 104, 1231.Google Scholar
Melrose, M. (2013a). Twenty-first century party people: Young people and sexual exploitation in the new millennium. Child Abuse Review, 22(3), 155–68.Google Scholar
Melrose, M. (2013b). Young people and sexual exploitation: A critical discourse analysis. In Melrose, M. and Pearce, J. (Eds.), Critical perspectives on child sexual exploitation and related trafficking (pp. 922). Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Mikton, C. & Butchart, A. (2009). Child maltreatment prevention: A systematic review of reviews. Bulletin of the World Health Organization, 87(5), 353–61.Google Scholar
Milon-Flores, D. F. & Cordeiro, R. L. F. (2022). How to take advantage of behavioral features for the early detection of grooming in online conversations. Knowledge-Based Systems, 240, 108017.Google Scholar
Mishna, F., Cook, C., Saini, M., Wu, M. J. & MacFadden, R. (2011). Interventions to prevent and reduce cyber abuse of youth: A systematic review. Research on Social Work Practice, 21(1), 514.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mullineux-Morgan, R. & Lorenzo-Dus, N. (2021). ‘He says I have to do anything he says else he’s coming to my house’: A discourse impoliteness approach on children’s perspectives on coercion in online child sexual grooming. 8th New Zealand Discourse Conference. 10–11 December, Christchurch, New Zealand.Google Scholar
Mullineux-Morgan, R. & Lorenzo-Dus, N. (2022). ‘He supported me through so much, and he always listened’. 10th International Symposium on Intercultural, Cognitive and Social Pragmatics (EPICS X), 23–25 May, Seville, Spain.Google Scholar
Nettel, A. L. & Roque, G. (2012). Persuasive argumentation versus manipulation. Argumentation, 26(1), 5569.Google Scholar
NSPCC. (2019). Taming the wild web. London: National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children.Google Scholar
NSPCC. (2020). How to win the wild west web. London: National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children.Google Scholar
NSPCC. (2021). End-to-end encryption: Understanding the impacts for child safety online. NSPCC report based on research undertaken by PA Consulting, April 2021. London: National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children.Google Scholar
O’Connell, R. (2003). A typology of child cybersexploitation and online grooming practices. Preston: University of Central Lancashire.Google Scholar
Ofcom. (2022). Children and parents: Media use and attitudes report 2022. In What children need (March). https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv2d7x4jp.4Google Scholar
Ofsted. (2014). The sexual exploitation of children: It couldn’t happen here could it? London: Ofsted.Google Scholar
Ofsted. (2016). Time to listen: A joined up response to child sexual exploitation and missing children. London: Ofsted.Google Scholar
O’Keefe, D. (2006). Persuasion. In Hargie, O. (Ed.), The handbook of communication skills (pp. 333–52). London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Pardo, M. L. (2001). Linguistic persuasion as an essential political factor in current democracies: Critical analysis of the globalization discourse in Argentina at the turn and at the end of the century. Discourse & Society, 12(1), 91118.Google Scholar
Partington, A. & Taylor, C. (2018). The language of persuasion in politics: An introduction. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Pearce, J. (2009). Beyond child protection: Young people, social exclusion and sexual exploitation. In Regulating sex for sale (pp. 121–36). Cambridge: Policy Press.Google Scholar
Pearce, J. (2019). Bringing theory home: Thinking about child sexual exploration. In Pearce, J. (Ed.) Child sexual exploitation: Why theory matters (pp. 122). Bristol: Bristol University Press.Google Scholar
Pendar, N. (2007). Toward spotting the pedophile: Telling victim from predator in text chats. International Conference on Semantic Computing (ICSC 2007), 235–41. www.computer.org/csdl/proceedings/icsc/2007/12OmNz2TCuGGoogle Scholar
Pennebaker, J. W., Boyd, R. L., Jordan, K. & Blackburn, K. (2015). The development and psychometric properties of LIWC2015. https://repositories.lib.utexas.edu/bitstream/handle/2152/31333/LIWC2015_LanguageManual.pdfGoogle Scholar
Powell, M. B., Casey, S. & Rouse, J. (2021). Online child sexual offenders’ language use in real-time chats. Trends and Issues in Crime and Criminal Justice, 643, 115.Google Scholar
Quayle, E., Jonsson, L. & Lööf, L. (2012). Online behaviour related to child sexual abuse. childrenatrisk.eu. http://childrenatrisk.eu/robert_old/public/Interviews_with_affected_young_people.pdfGoogle Scholar
Reinharz, S. & Davidman, L. (1992). Feminist methods in social research. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Reynold, E. & Ringrose, J. (2011). Schizoid subjectivities? Re-theorizing teen girls’ sexual cultures in an era of ‘sexualization’. Journal of Sociology, 47(4), 389409.Google Scholar
Ringrose, J., Gill, R., Livingstone, S. & Harvey, L. (2012). A qualitative study of children, young people and ‘sexting’. A report prepared for the NSPCC. London: NSPCC.Google Scholar
Schneevogt, D., Chiang, E. & Grant, T. (2018). Do Perverted Justice chat logs contain examples of overt persuasion and sexual extortion? A research note responding to Chiang and Grant (2017, 2018). Language and Law/Linguagem e Direito, 5(1), 97102.Google Scholar
Searle, J. R. (1969/1975). Speech acts: An essay in the philosophy of language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Searle, J. R. (1978). Intentionality and the use of language. Studies in the Linguistic Sciences, 8(2), 149–62.Google Scholar
Seto, M. C. (2019). The motivation-facilitation model of sexual offending. Sexual Abuse, 31(1), 324.Google Scholar
Seymour-Smith, S. & Kloess, J. A. (2021). A discursive analysis of compliance, resistance and escalation to threats in sexually exploitative interactions between offenders and male children. British Journal of Social Psychology, 60(3), 9881011.Google Scholar
Sidebotham, P. (2013). Culpability, vulnerability, agency and potential: Exploring our attitudes to victims and perpetrators of abuse. Child Abuse Review, 22(3), 151–4.Google Scholar
Sorlin, S. (2017). The pragmatics of manipulation: Exploiting im/politeness theories. Journal of Pragmatics, 121, 132–46.Google Scholar
Swales, J. (1990). Genre analysis: English in academic and research settings. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Swales, J. (2004). Research genres: Exploration and applications. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Taylor, J. (2020). Why women are blamed for everything: Exposing the culture of victim-blaming. New York: Little, Brown Publishers.Google Scholar
Terkourafi, M. (2011). From politeness1 to politeness2: Tracking norms of im/politeness across time and space. Journal of Politeness Research: Language, Behaviour, Culture, 7(2), 159–85.Google Scholar
Topping, K. J. & Barron, I. G. (2009). School-based child sexual abuse prevention programs: A review of effectiveness. Review of Educational Research, 79(1), 431–63.Google Scholar
UNICEF. (2020). What works to prevent online and offline child sexual exploitation and abuse? Review of national education strategies in East Asia and the Pacific. www.unicef.org/eap/Google Scholar
van Dijk, T. A. (2006). Discourse and manipulation. Discourse and Society, 17(3), 359–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
van Dijk, T. A. (2008). Discourse and context: A sociocognitive approach. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
van Dijk, T. A. (2017). How globo media manipulated the impeachment of Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff. Discourse & Communication, 11(2), 199229.Google Scholar
van Gijn-Grosvenor, E. L. & Lamb, M. E. (2021). Online groomer typology scheme. Psychology, Crime & Law, 27(10), 973–87.Google Scholar
van Leeuwen, T. (1996). The representation of social actors. In Caldas-Coulthard, C. and Coulthard, M. (Eds.), Texts and practices: Readings in critical discourse analysis (pp. 3270). London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Villacampa, C. & Gómez, M. J. (2017). Online child sexual grooming: Empirical findings on victimisation and perspectives on legal requirements. International Review of Victimology, 23(2), 105–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Walsh, K., Zwi, K., Woolfenden, S. & Shlonsky, A. (2018). School-based education programs for the prevention of child sexual abuse: A Cochrane systematic review and meta-analysis. Research on Social Work Practice, 28(1), 3355.Google Scholar
Webster, S., Davidson, J., Bifulco, A., et al. (2012). European online grooming project: Final report. European Commission Safer Internet Plus Programme, Tech. Rep., 1152.Google Scholar
Whittle, H., Hamilton-Giachritsis, C. & Beech, A. (2014). ‘Under his spell’: Victims’ perspectives of being groomed online. Social Sciences, 3(3), 404–26.Google Scholar
Whittle, H. C., Hamilton-Giachritsis, C. E., Beech, A. R. & Collings, G. (2013). A review of online grooming: Characteristics and concerns. Aggression and Violent Behavior, 18(1), 6270.Google Scholar
WHO (2023). Adolescent Health. The World Health Organization. https://www.who.int/health-topics/adolescent-health#tab=tab_1Google Scholar
Widdowson, H. G. (2004). Text, context, pretext: Critical issues in discourse analysis. New York: Wiley.Google Scholar
Williams, R., Elliott, I. A. & Beech, A. R. (2013). Identifying sexual grooming themes used by internet sex offenders. Deviant Behavior, 34(2), 135–52.Google Scholar
Winters, G. M., Kaylor, L. E. & Jeglic, E. L. (2017). Sexual offenders contacting children online: An examination of transcripts of sexual grooming. Journal of Sexual Aggression, 23(1), 6276.Google Scholar
Wolak, J. & Finkelhor, D. (2016). Sextortion: Key findings from an online survey of 1,631 victims. Janis Wolak & David Finkelhor CCRC in partnership with Thorn. www.unh.edu/ccrc/.Google Scholar
Woodby, L. L., Williams, B. R., Wittich, A. R. et al. (2011). Expanding the notion of research distress: The cumulative effects of coding. Qualitative Health Research, 21(6), 830–8.Google Scholar

Save element to Kindle

To save this element to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Online Child Sexual Grooming Discourse
Available formats
×

Save element to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Online Child Sexual Grooming Discourse
Available formats
×

Save element to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Online Child Sexual Grooming Discourse
Available formats
×