This chapter explores the types of behaviour seen in sex offending. It covers how behaviour has been used to create typologies of offending, as well as how both internal factors – such as fantasy and offender characteristics, and external factors – such as the number of offenders present and the cultural influence on behaviour – can affect sex offender behaviour. It also explores how behaviour can be conceptualised as a pattern demonstrated across a series of offences, and the factors that can affect the consistency of this behaviour. Finally, this chapter outlines how our understanding of sex offender behaviour can contribute to the investigation, assessment, management, and treatment of sex offenders.

Chapter 9 examines the consequences of subjecting children to SORN laws. It argues that registration and notification laws are uniquely ineffective and harmful when applied to children. The chapter begins with a history of how SORN laws came to regulate juvenile sexual misconduct. In response to moral panics around “sexual predators” and “juvenile super-predators,” policymakers explicitly expanded the scope of SORN laws to cover children adjudicated delinquent of sex offenses. The chapter next evaluates the effects of these laws on juvenile offending, particularly recidivism. Contrary to the myths underlying their enactment, children found to have engaged in sexual misconduct very rarely reoffend. Further, the evidence is unanimous that SORN laws do not reduce recidivism. The chapter then compiles evidence on the many deleterious effects SORN laws produce when they are applied to children. Studies of providers and children who are registrants demonstrate that SORN laws increase substantially the risk of suicide and sexual victimization. Furthermore, SORN laws are associated with high rates of plea bargaining among children. In light of these failures and dangerous effects, the application of SORN to children should be abandoned.