This study evaluated a personal safety educational program designed for Latino families attending preschools in a large metropolis. Seventy-eight children who participated in the Kids Learning About Safety program were compared to 45 control children. Compared with controls, participating children demonstrated enhanced ability to recognize…

Objective: This study examined the ability of children to recognize "good" people as potential perpetrators prior to and after completing a personal safety program. There were three objectives to the study. The first was to determine whether young children could recognize the inappropriateness of a sexual request coming from people described as…

Preschoolers' knowledge of genital names facilitates disclosure of sexual abuse and provides the foundation for subsequent sex education. Surveys of preschoolers in the early 1990s found that few children knew proper names for the genitals. To determine knowledge among a current cohort of culturally diverse children, 128 preschool children were…

The reliability of the "What If" Situations Test was studied to determine its utility as an evaluation tool for young children (N=406), which would provide a measurement tool with demonstrated psychometric properties for evaluating child sexual abuse-prevention programs. Advantages and limitations of the measure are presented and…

Compared effectiveness with preschoolers (N=100) of two personal safety skills training approaches: feelings-based program, which instructs children to trust their feelings, and behavioral skills program, which focuses on behavior of others. Found both training approaches effective in enhancing children's knowledge and presentation skills;…

Evaluation of a personal safety program with 172 preschoolers found that participants demonstrated greater knowledge about sexual abuse and higher levels of personal safety skills than controls, that children taught by their parents recognized inappropriate-touch requests better than children taught by teachers, and that children taught at both…

To compare the effectiveness of parents and teachers as instructors of a personal safety program, 61 low-income preschoolers participated in either a home-based, school-based, or control program. No significant differences were found between groups taught by teachers or parents. Both groups demonstrated greater knowledge of sexual abuse and…

A survey was conducted to measure the attitudes and beliefs of parents of preschoolers about child sexual abuse prevention programs. Surveys were distributed to parents at various programs serving 3- to 5-year-old children in a Colorado community. The survey gathered information on parents' demographic characteristics, involvement in prevention…