Child Sexual Abuse Prevention and Response Behaviors Among a Sample of Youth Football Coaches

Youth sports can be ideal settings for supporting youth development. Youth sports can also, however, create settings that put athletes at risk for experiencing child sexual abuse (CSA). Many youth coaches are encouraged or required to complete child abuse prevention education modules to learn how to identify warning signs of abuse and how to help if CSA is identified. However, research on coaches' confidence in identifying and preventing CSA is limited. In this formative research study, we develop and test new measures that will be used in a randomized controlled trial to evaluate the effectiveness of an adult-focused CSA prevention program. Measures include coach knowledge of CSA, confidence in preventing and responding to CSA, and engagement in CSA prevention and response behaviors. We recruited a national sample of 107 youth football coaches and league leaders to complete the survey. In the current study, we discuss preliminary findings on the relationships between knowledge, perception, and behaviors in our sample. We also discuss current limitations of the measures and offer recommendations for addressing them in future use.