Childhood abuse and its association with mid-aged women's sexual functioning

Abstract

The aim of this study was to investigate the association of recalled childhood sexual and physical abuse with current sexual functioning in mid-life. The sample was participants in the longitudinal population-based cohort of mid-aged women, The Melbourne Women's Midlife Health Project. Three hundred sixty two of the women (92% of the available cohort) were administered the Violence Questionnaire in the sixth year of follow-up. This included questions on physical abuse and sexual abuse experienced in childhood. We used the Short Personal Experiences Questionnaire (Dennerstein, Anderson-Hunt, & Dudley, 2002) to assess current sexual functioning. Forty eight percent of the women had no experien..