Skip to main navigation Skip to main content
Queensland Government - logo Queensland Government - logo
Child Safety Practice Manual

Overview

In Australia, 28.5% of children experience child sexual abuse and 11% of those children are sexually abused more than 50 times. Use this kit to apply a contemporary child sexual abuse lens to child protection assessment, understand its impact on families and inform your practice with families where the sexual abuse of children is a concern.

Content updates

This page was updated on 23 June 2026. To view changes, please see page updates

Conceptualising child sexual abuse

Child sexual abuse occurs when a child experiences sexual behaviour they don’t understand, don’t consent to, or is otherwise unlawful. This includes:

  • ‘contact’ or ’hands on’ sexual abuse
  • sexual grooming
  • harmful sexual behaviours 
  • child sexual abuse material 
  • sexual exploitation
  • various forms of ‘non-contact’ abuse, such as exposure to pornography or other sexual material or behaviour. 

All forms of sexual abuse cause profound harm and disruption to the child and their family.

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child highlights that governments must protect children from violence and abuse, including sexual abuse and exploitation. It also outlines that children have the right to choose and share their views, to be taken seriously by adults and to not be separated from their parents unless required for their safety or wellbeing. Child protection practitioners have a key role in upholding children’s rights when assessing and responding to concerns about sexual abuse.

Infographic showing overall national prevalence of child sexual abuse in Australia
Source: Australian Child Maltreatment Study

Child sexual abuse in Australia is gendered with 91% of alleged offenders being male (Sullivan et al.). Girls experience more than double the rate of child sexual abuse than boys (Mathews et al. (a)) and people with diverse gender identities are more likely to experience child sexual abuse than both girls and boys (Higgins et al. (a)). 

Children experience sexual abuse within a broad context of relationships including peers, sibling, parents, extended family members and extrafamilial community members, including adults working in child-serving organisations. 

Child sexual abuse most often occurs in the context of other experiences of abuse, neglect, or family dysfunction. Assessment of whether a parent is willing and able to protect their child from sexual abuse requires consideration of the full context in which the abuse occurred, and any factors which may have contributed to the abuse being undisclosed or undiscovered. This requires understanding the impact of the sexual abuse on the family system, the capacity of the child’s parents to provide future protection and support for post-abuse healing, and any dysfunctions within the family system that contributed to circumstances in which the sexual abuse occurred. 

Further reading

Australian Child Maltreatment Study:

Definitions

Developing a shared understanding of sexual abuse is essential, as definitions can vary across sectors and governments, both nationally and internationally. Professionals working in legal, therapeutic, child protection, education, and welfare sectors may use different definitions in practice, which can complicate collaboration. 

The following terms and definitions are useful to support a shared understanding of different forms of sexual abuse. 

Abuse type Definition
Child sexual abuse

Child sexual abuse occurs when the following 4 factors are present:

  1. The person experiencing the behaviour is a child.
  2. The child either cannot or did not consent.
  3. The behaviour was sexual, the child legitimately experiencing the behaviour as sexual, or the person engaging in the behaviour seeking sexual gratification for themselves or someone else.
  4. The behaviour was abusive either due to a relationship of power, inequality, exploitation or the absence of consent (Mathews and Collins, Haslam et al.).
Child sexual exploitation

Child sexual exploitation is a form of child sexual abuse that occurs when an individual or group attempts to or succeeds in coercing, manipulating or deceiving a child into contact or non-contact sexual acts:

  • in exchange for something including, but not limited to, money, gifts or accommodation or less tangible goods such as affection or status 

or

  • for the financial advantage, increased status or other reward for the person or people exploiting the child.

A child over the legal age of consent may have been sexually exploited even if the sexual act appears consensual.

(Australian Institute of Health and Welfare)
Child sexual abuse material or child sexual exploitation material Material depicting or describing any of the following: 
  • a person who is, appears to be or is implied to be, a child as a victim of sexual abuse 
  • a person who is, appears to be or is implied to be, a child engaged in or apparently engaged in a sexual pose or sexual activity (whether or not in the presence of other persons) 
  • a person who is, appears to be or is implied to be, a child in the presence of another person who is engaged or apparently engaged in a sexual pose or sexual activity
  • the private parts of a person who is, appears to be or is implied to be, a child (Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation).
Harmful sexual behaviour and sibling harmful sexual behaviour Sexual behaviour by a child outside the range typically accepted as ‘normal’ for their age and level of development (Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse).
Sexual grooming

Intentional behaviours that manipulate and control a child, as well as their family, kin and carers, other support networks, or organisations to perpetrate child sexual abuse. 

While child sexual abuse often occurs after or alongside grooming, acts of abuse do not need to occur for grooming to have taken place. Similarly, perpetrators can sexually abuse a child without grooming having taken place (National Office for Child Safety).

Practice prompt

It is illegal for anyone to engage in any form of sexual activity with anyone under the age of 16. In Queensland the law recognises people under the age of 16 cannot consent to sexual activity. For advice related to sexual activity between children under the age of 16, refer to Harmful sexual behaviours.

It is illegal for any person in a position of care, supervision or authority over a child aged between 16 and 17 years to engage in sexual activity with that child. 

Previous

Child sexual abuse

 Next

Overview of child sexual abuse

Version history

Back to top

Published on:

Last reviewed:

  • Date: 
    Launch of new content 23 June 2026
  • Date: 
    Launch of new content 23 June 2026
  • Date: 
    Launch of new practice kit
  • Date: 
    Launch of new practice kit
  • Date: 
    Launch of new practice kit