Crime Victimization and the Stages of Childhood Crime Victimization and the Stages of Childhood Childhood is a period characterized by dramatic developmental changes, so generalizations about all juvenile victims must be tempered by a recognition of the effects of age differences. However, it is not certain to what extent teenagers are actually more victimized than younger children. Thus, the association between victimization and age shown in figure 6 may be an effect of the less frequent reporting of crimes involving younger victims to the police.
Statutory rape is a teen-exclusive pattern crime.
Forcible sodomy, sexual assaults with objects, forcible fondling, and incest all appear to be transchildhood pattern crimes, with substantial proportions of victims ages 6 to 11 and even younger. Forcible rape conforms to the teen-predominant pattern, with approximately 24 percent of victims younger than age 12. Of course, these patterns are not necessarily illustrative of the true distribution of crime because they reflect patterns of reporting and may also be influenced by the way crimes are defined or classified. With the exception of homicide, it assembles no information on the details of crime incidents.