The Scottish Government’s 2020 report by the Expert Group on Preventing Sexual Offending Involving Children and Young People defines Harmful Sexual Behaviours as:

"Sexual behaviours expressed by children and young people under the age of 18 that are developmentally inappropriate and may be harmful towards self or others and/or be abusive towards another child or young person".

There is a range of common and healthy sexual behaviours at ages from early years to young adulthood. Some children and young people may develop inappropriate and problematic habits, or display sexually harmful behaviour. Other children may be victims of harmful sexual behaviour. When a child or young person behaves in ways considered to be outside this range, their behaviour may be called 'harmful' because it is harmful to themselves or others.

Distinguishing between appropriate non-abusive behaviour and inappropriate or abusive behaviour can be a complex task that requires practitioners to have an understanding of what is healthy and informed consent and what is abusive or coercive behaviour.

This resource provides information about how to identify, understand and respond appropriately to sexual behaviours in young people. It includes national guidance, third sector support and good practice exemplars.

It is important to remember to follow your own local authority safeguarding and child protection guidance and procedures.

The Hackett Continuum

Children’s sexual behaviours sit on a continuum and offers 5 areas of behaviour. These range from normal, experimental and expected through behaviours that are inappropriate or problematic. These may cause limited harm to other children but would need to be monitored and addressed. The continuum then describes behaviours that are clearly abusive and cause harm.

Normal

Normal behaviours include shared decision making and are:

• developmentally appropriate
• socially acceptable
• consensual, mutual and reciprocal

Inappropriate

Inappropriate behaviour may include single instances of inappropriate sexual behaviour. These may be:

• socially acceptable within peer group
• consensual and reciprocated
• contextually inappropriate

Problematic

Problematic and concerning behaviours:

• do not show overt elements of victimisation
• are developmentally unusual and socially unexpected
• may lack reciprocity or equal power
• may include levels of compulsivity
• may lack clear consent

Abusive

Violent

Violent behaviour may involve:

• physically violent sexual abuse
• sadistic behaviour
• highly intrusive behaviour

Abusive and violent behaviours require immediate action and should be reported via your organisation’s safeguarding and child protection procedures. Where these is an immediate risk of harm, please call police on 999.

Evidence-based guidance

Working with children and young people who have displayed harmful sexual behaviour offers evidence-based guidance for professionals in Scotland dealing with children and young people showing harmful sexual behaviour (HSB). The guidance highlights the need for a holistic approach, considering individual needs, circumstances, and development factors, while also stressing the significance of safeguarding and risk management strategies.

Managing and preventing harmful sexual behaviour guidelines

Safety Planning in Education

Safety Planning in Education supports education professionals’ knowledge, skills and confidence to understand and respond to incidents of harmful sexual behaviour and ensure the safety of all children and young people is addressed.

The Beyond Referrals self-assessment toolkit is intended to support schools to identify and assess the factors that contribute to addressing HSB in schools. The Beyond Referrals project launched this toolkit in 2018, following research in schools. This new updated version includes new levers and guidance on carrying out the self-assessment. The toolkit is supported by online tutorials available on the Contextual Safeguarding Network.

This guidance includes:

• a traffic light tool which forms the basis of the self-assessment
• an example completed assessment (Appendix A) to help schools to score themselves using the tool
• a blank assessment self-assessment template (Appendix B) which can be printed or completed online

This guidance is supported by an online toolkit that can be accessed and includes:

• online versions of the traffic light tool and templates
• self-assessment method guides
• scoring template to enter your scores

These Managing and Preventing Harmful Sexual Behaviour guidelines (PDF file) have been produced as a response to the sexual health needs of young people in Forth Valley. The purpose of the document is to allow all staff whether in the role of teacher, learning assistant, janitor or administrator, to use this as a reference and guide for their practice. It aims to support staff to understand how to respond and manage the sexual behaviours of the children and young people in their school.

The Lucy Faithfull Foundation Scotland has launched Shore Space. This is a website focused on providing support to young people who may be worried about their own, or someone else’s thoughts feelings or actions. Shore is an anonymous advice and support service which helps young people to manage worrying thoughts and to live safety both online and offline.

Responding to young people’s experience of sexual violence for schools supports staff working with young people who have been affected by sexual violence. This can be an emotive area of work and it can sometimes be difficult to know what to do to support young people who have experienced this or who have been identified as potential perpetrators.

Young people tell us that we can improve our response to them, and this guide has been written to reflect their comments and experience. This guidance was initially created by the Rape and Sexual Abuse Service Highland and has been amended for use by The Rosey Project. The Rosey Project is a support and prevention project for young people aged 13-25 at Glasgow and Clyde Rape Crisis.

Recognising sexual behaviours documents

Harmful sexual behaviour by children and young people: Expert Group report This report, published by the Scottish Government in January 2020, sets out proposals from the Expert Group on Preventing Sexual Offending Involving Children and Young People to improve prevention and early intervention in response to harmful sexual behaviour involving children and young people.

National guidance for child protection in Scotland
This is the refreshed National Guidance for Scotland published in 2021 and updated in 2023.

National Guidance for Child Protection in Scotland. Additional notes for practitioners (2014). Protecting disabled children from abuse and neglect.

An Impact Report by Childnet  follows the pilot of Online Sexual Harassment resources created in Project deSHAME to address peer on peer sexual harassment.

The NSPCC have published information and advice focused on Understanding sexualised behaviour in children.  This includes a graphic linked to the Hackett Continuum (PDF) which details how to respond to sexualised behaviours.

The Shore  website is a safe space for teenagers worried about sexual behaviour. Shore is a service run by the Lucy Faithfull Foundation that provides anonymous advice, information, and support for teenagers who are worried about their own sexual thoughts, feelings, or behaviour, or about someone else's behaviour. It also offers guidance on topics such as consent, online safety, harmful sexual behaviour, grooming, and the law.

What to do when harmful sexual behaviour is identified

At all times however, it is important to remember to follow your own local authority safeguarding and child protection guidance and procedures.

Where sexual abuse of a child or young person is alleged to have been carried out by another child or young person, such behaviour should always be treated seriously and be subject to a discussion between relevant agencies that covers both the victim and the perpetrator.

In all cases where a child or young person acts in a sexually abusive fashion, immediate consideration should be given to whether action needs to be taken under child protection procedures, either in order to protect the victim or to tackle concerns about what has caused the child or young person to behave in such a way.

Current guidance outlines the role that a multi-agency care and risk management has to play in such situations. This ensures that a clear assessment of risk takes place and proportionate risk management measures are implemented. These are subject to regular review to ensure further abuse does not occur.

Learning and teaching resources

Relationships, Sexual Health and Parenthood (RSHP) is a resource for teaching across all the levels of Curriculum for Excellence linked to relationships, sexual health and parenthood (RSHP) education for children and young people. This site contains activities linked to keeping safe and consent.

The resource was described as the ‘go-to resource’ in the Scottish Government’s Expert Group report on Preventing Sexual Offending Involving Children and Young People (2020) in terms of preventing and managing harmful sexual behaviour for children and young people.

Just a joke? from Childnet provides lesson plans, quick activities, a quiz and teaching guide. These can help practitioners to explore problematic online sexual behaviour with 9 to 12 year-olds.

Improvement questions

1. To what extent do we review our safeguarding procedures and incidents as part of our self-evaluation processes? This includes the review of any incidents of inappropriate sexualised behaviour.

2. How confident are staff in distinguishing between appropriate non-abusive behaviour and inappropriate or abusive behaviour?

3. To what extent do staff support children and young people to understand what constitutes healthy and informed consent and what is abusive or coercive behaviour?

4. How effectively do we support children and young people who display inappropriate, problematic or sexually harmful behaviour?