Offenders tend to be out of touch with their feelings and sexualize their feelings. Precursive states such as loneliness, stress, and powerlessness are predictors of risk. Denial, blame, rationalization, and minimization are the main defenses of offenders. Offenders have been living a life of deceit and minimization, often for years. Denial keeps them from having to look at themselves and the consequences of their behavior.
Offenders tend to be narcissistic and seem unable to have empathy for their victims.
Many offenders experience arousal over seeing their victim's suffering. With male incest offenders, there appears to be two prominent patterns with respect to the relationship between husband and wife. For mothers who sexually abuse their children, many of the same dynamics and motivations are present as with sexually abusive fathers. Clinical Approaches to Sex Offenders and their Victims edited by Hollin and Howells. Has extreme feelings of guilt.