Mireille Cyr...
For a number of years Mireille Cyr's research has focused on children, sexually abused adolescents and their mothers. These projects, grouped in three main categories, are carried out in the scope of Centre de recherche interdisciplinaire sur les problèmes conjugaux et les agressions sexuelles (CRIPCAS) activities.
The first category examines victim sequelae and the capacity of victim adaptation according to various parameters with respect to abuse characteristics, family and services received.
The second category consists of better understanding mothers and fathers who are not abusers of sexually abused children and to describe the impact disclosure of the abuse may have on them. This research attempts in part to verify the importance and impact maternal and paternal support offered victims has on the child or adolescent. The influence of parental characteristics (for example, their depressive or dissociative status, sexual abuse of which they were also victims in childhood, their social support, conjugal distress) on their support capacity and their parental practices represent other study variables. Factors responsible for intergenerational transmission are also explored. Preferred interventions for parents, depending on whether they were or were not sexually abused in childhood, are equally assessed in the scope of new research.
A third category focuses on investigative interviews of children suspected of having experienced sexual abuse. This research aims at verifying the effectiveness of the protocol of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) in Washington, first, in the reduction of directive and suggestive behaviour by interviewers (to preserve assessment process integrity) and second, in increasing credibility of the child's testimony by the quality and quantity of details given relative to sexual abuse. Carried out in cooperation with Michael Lamb of Cambridge University, an additional objective of this research is to develop information on children's personal and family factors potentially influencing testimony.
