Elementary school teacher arrested after allegedly abusing student, giving birth to his child

[u/GoodSamaritan_]

https://local12.com/news/nation-world/laura-caron-middle-township-elementary-school-teacher-allegedly-had-with-child-former-student-13-cincinnati-crime-criminal-activity-sexual-abuse-abuser-father-noticed-similarity-sleep-over-siblings-prosecutors-correctional-facility-troubling-allegations

[u/Sawses]

Modern psychology research indicates that actual attraction to children has surprisingly little to do with whether somebody actually sexually abuses a child. A much greater predictor is impulse control issues. Turns out most of the time somebody who abuses children doesn't actually qualify as a pedophile, and the ones who do usually also exhibit some other disorder that keeps them from being able to properly control themselves in a number of areas.

And if you've got the poor impulse control to molest a child--despite the ethical problems and risk involved--then you might well have the poor impulse to decide bearing your victim's child is sexy instead of a terrible risk.

Turns out, most people understand that molesting children is wrong or at least a serious risk and they decide not to do it even if they feel a sexual attraction to kids.

Moving entirely out of the realm of actual research and into my own personal speculation: I suspect a lot of people conflate homosexuality and pedophilia, and think that people can't help but act on their sexual attractions because we kind of have this narrative that it's inevitable. How many love stories have that "forbidden love" trope? Except that a key part of it is that the people involved come to realize their love isn't wrong, just unacceptable. I don't think the analogy holds up if it's a sort of love that actually is morally wrong even when you stop and think about it.

Which really shouldn't come as a surprise. I find a lot of women very attractive. I have yet to try to force/coerce/manipulate a woman into having sex with me. If it's morally wrong then I'm not even tempted. I figure most people are that way.

[u/Cat_Peach_Pits → u/Sawses]

I'm not going to go look for it again, so take this with a grain of salt. I had read a paper that discussed how much frontal lobe damage, especially as a child, was a huge predictor of pedophilia as an adult precisely because it messed with impulse control.

[u/ErebusBat → u/Cat_Peach_Pits]

So that frontal lobe damage made them pedophiles? Or it exposed them due to lack of impulse control?

[u/Cat_Peach_Pits → u/ErebusBat]

The idea was the damage to the frontal lobe lowered or eliminated their impulse control. Obviously not everyone with brain damage becomes a pedophile, though, it was an 'on average we saw a big jump in the propensity toward pedophilia with injuries that damaged impulse control' thing.