Talk:David Finkelhor

Biog

Apparently, he has a biography, formerly located at a now removed external link. Any help finding this would be appreciated. Daniel Lièvre (talk) 18:56, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

Controversies

According to the article on Peter Ellis and the Christchurch Civic Creche case, 'Finkelhor's work has since been discredited' (Section, 'Smart Report'). The 'work' concerned is that documented in his book 'Nursery Crimes' which is discredited by association. This is not mentioned anywhere I can see in the article, which treats this and other works of his as authoritative. They can't both be right.

I am aware, and editors are probably aware, of the ideological element in 'expert' work on child abuse, and it's advisable to know the standpoint any 'expert' adopts. Chrismorey (talk) 16:32, 1 January 2022 (UTC)

Have my changes clarified it at all, Chrismorey? 172.195.96.244 (talk) 00:54, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Fine, thanks. I added a heading before the last para 'Controversies', as is common practice elsewhere. Chrismorey (talk) 07:48, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Weeell... from the article, one cannot tell if Finkelhor supported the Satanic panic (he did) or was skeptical of it, agreeing with the scientific consensus. Just that he said something (what?) about it and someone else disagreed with him. That makes the article a bit incomplete. I would repair it if I were more of an expert in this, but I am not. --Hob Gadling (talk) 09:07, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

The material at Satanic panic#United States might help, Hob Gadling. 172.195.96.244 (talk) 10:34, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Thank you! Now we only need this article to be expanded in that direction without copy-paste. --Hob Gadling (talk) 11:03, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Be wary of implying guilt by association with the Rind et al controversy. This article simply mentions he was cited by Rind et al, which is not in itself controversial. The context of Finkelhor's work to Rind et al. is missing. And crtitiques or associations should not be framed as a controversy unless largely framed as such in reliable secondary sources. Criticism and disagreements are routine in academia; they need not be granted undue prominence. See WP:PROPORTION and WP:BLPBALANCE, as well as WP:CRITS. --Animalparty! (talk) 18:02, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

I agree, Animalparty. Before I did my small expansion, Rind and de Young's criticisms were grouped together and neither gave context. Having noticed that de Young's criticism addressed only one area of Finkelhor's work and was totally unrelated to Rind's investigation, I tried to separate them and to make the sentence that referenced the Rind et al. controversy clear that Rind's work was controversial. From position and further publications / citations, etc, my impression is that Finkelhor is a mainstream and notable academic who stuffed up on the satanic abuse work and has been criticised for it, but is in a different category from Rind. I am not certain that a "controversies" section is warranted, more likely an NPOV section on the Nursery Crimes work, and Rind (if DUE) placed elsewhere. 172.195.96.244 (talk) 00:27, 3 January 2022 (UTC)

Additional secondary sources

This article still needs needs work to ensure accuracy, fairness and due weight per WP:BLP and WP:NPOV. Criticism may be warranted where appropriate, but should not dominate, nor distort the big picture. From my incomplete survey of a diversity of sources, Finkelhor is widely cited in books and journals (h-index of 148 and i10-index of 364 according to Google Scholar) and still widely considered an authority in childhood abuse and domestic violence (still routinely interviewed and quoted), although some of his work in relation to ritualistic abuse has been criticized (perhaps even "discredited"). Care should be taken to ensure that criticism of some research is not worded to imply that all of his research is suspect, discredited, or controversial, nor to imply a false-equivalence, i.e. that all criticism is equally valid (critics appear to include Mary de Young, Bruce Rind, and Debbie Nathan), nor that the critic's view is necessarily more correct. I place here a wide selection of sources that might be used to improve the biography. I'm not advocating that every source needs be included, nor that every study he's done need mention. But every fact should be appropriate and every sentence have a purpose that makes sense in the article overall. --Animalparty! (talk) 23:15, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

• "Abuse Found in Older Couples". The New York Times. November 23, 1986. A new study of family violence and older Americans has found that the elderly are much more likely to be physically or verbally abused by their spouses than by their children...
• Brody, Jane E. (January 13, 1987). "Therapists Seek Causes of Child Molesting". The New York Times. Dr. David Finkelhor, a New Hampshire sociologist who is a widely recognized authority on the subject [of child molestation]...
• Allen, Ernie (July 1994). "Missing children: a fearful epidemic". USA Today. Vol. 123, no. 2590. p. 46. The publicity and media furor generated by the best-known cases created controversy over the true nature and extent of the missing and exploited child problem in America. As a result, Congress directed that a national incidence study be undertaken by the Justice Department. The research - conducted by David Finkelhor of the University of New Hampshire, Gerald Hotaling of the University of Lowell, and Andrea Sedlak of Westat, Inc., and released in 1990 - provided the first comprehensive, scientific examination of the situation, consistent definitions, and a platform for doing more extensive research and analysis...
• Russell, Diana E. H. (2000). The Epidemic of Rape and Child Sexual Abuse in the United States. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications. ISBN 978-0-7619-0301-7. (frequent discussion of the work of Finkelhor and colleagues throughout).
• "The Web's Dark Secret". Newsweek. March 19, 2001. p. 44.
• Graff, E.J. (July 9, 2012). "The news on abuse". Newsweek. Vol. 160, no. 2. p. 12. University of New Hampshire professor David Finkelhor, widely considered the premier researcher on crimes against children, reports that substantiated cases of child sexual abuse have declined 53 percent since 1990...
• Jones, Abigail (July 3, 2015). "The Hunt for Child Sex Abusers Is Happening in the Wrong Places; When it comes to child abuse, fear everyone but the stranger". Newsweek. Vol. 165, no. 1.
• "Professor David Finkelhor and Alumnus John "Jack" Smith Receive UNH's Most Prestigious Awards". UNH Today. University of New Hampshire. October 16, 2015. Finkelhor is widely cited for his work showing that many forms of childhood victimization have been declining in recent years, in contrast to widespread public perceptions

Book reviews

• Burgess, Ann Wolbert (1980). "Review of Sexually Victimized Children". Social Work. 25 (6): 504–505. ISSN 0037-8046.
• Schilmoeller, Gary L. (July 1980). "Review: Sexually Victimized Children". Family Relations. 29 (3): 414. doi:10.2307/583868.
• Rogers, Carl M. (May 1981). "Review: Sexually Victimized Children". Journal of Marriage and the Family. 43 (2): 466. doi:10.2307/351401.
• Fagan, Jeffrey A. (1986). "Child Sexual Abuse: New Theory and Research". The Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology. 77 (2): 477. doi:10.2307/1143341.
• de Young, Mary (1986). "Review of Child Sexual Abuse: New Theory and Research". Child Welfare. 65 (2): 202–204. ISSN 0009-4021. JSTOR 45389732.
• Dobash, R. Emerson (July 1986). "Review: License to Rape: Sexual Abuse of Wives". Contemporary Sociology. 15 (4): 593. doi:10.2307/2069296.
• "Review: A Sourcebook on Child Sexual Abuse". Family Relations. 36 (3): 345. July 1987. doi:10.2307/583557.
• Garbarino, James (August 1987). "Review: A Sourcebook on Child Sexual Abuse". Journal of Marriage and the Family. 49 (3): 697. doi:10.2307/352218.

Nursery Crimes and ritual abuse research

• Welch, Michael (May 1990). "Book Review: Nursery Crimes: Sexual Abuse in Day Care". Criminal Justice Review. 15 (1): 94–96. doi:10.1177/073401689001500116.
• Horsnell, Michael; Dutta, Robi (June 3, 1994). "Inquiry dismisses satanic abuse as evangelical myth". The Times. London. p. 4. Recent thinking among social workers is also based on the work of David Finkelhor, author of Nursery Crimes, published in 1988. Mr Finkelhor, who endorsed unsubstantiated reports of ritual abuse, defined three types: mentally disturbed abusers acting singly or in couples; pseudo-satanic abuse in which abusers use occult trappings to abuse; and members of rings, which link into international networks of satanists.
• Nathan, Debbie (2001). Satan's Silence: Ritual Abuse and the Making of a Modern American Witch Hunt. New York: Authors Choice Press. pp. 132–136. ISBN 9780595189557.