pedophilia
English
Alternative forms
- paedophilia (British)
- pædophilia (British, dated)
Etymology
Adapted from German Pädophilie, bringing its spelling into conformity with pedo- + -philia. Compare the Byzantine Greek παιδοφιλία (paidophilía, “love of children”).
Pronunciation
- (UK) IPA(key): /ˌpiː.dəˈfɪ.li.ə/
Audio (UK) (file) - (General Australian) IPA(key): /ˌpe.dəˈfɪ.li.ə/
- (US) IPA(key): /ˌpɛ.dəˈfi.li.ə/
- Rhymes: -ɪliə
- Hyphenation: ped‧o‧phil‧i‧a
Noun
pedophilia (countable and uncountable, plural pedophilias) (American spelling)
- Sexual attraction to children by adults.
- Synonyms: (euphemistic) childlove, pederosis, (psychiatry) pedophilic disorder
- Antonyms: teleiophilia, pedophobia
- Coordinate terms: hebephilia, ephebophilia, pederasty, korephilia, teleiophilia
- Hypernym: paraphilia
- 2007, Margaret Mary Wright, Judicial decision making in child sexual abuse cases, page 122:
- As noted earlier, pedophilia was cited as both an aggravating and a mitigating circumstance by trial judges, as was the absence of pedophilia.
- 2009, Ann Kring, Sheri Johnson, Gerald C. Davison, Abnormal Psychology:
- Sometimes a man with pedophilia is content to stroke the child's hair, but he may also manipulate the child's genitalia, [...]
- For more quotations using this term, see Citations:pedophilia.
- (by extension) Sexual activity between adults and children; the act of child molestation.
- Synonym: pedosexuality
- 1998, Kaufman, Andrew L., Cardozo, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, →ISBN, page 25:
- Fifteen months later, a committee of the congregation found that he had sexually abused several boys within the congregation. […] The fact that Alger committed pedophilia at the age of thirty-four casts a shadow over his subsequent yearning for relationships with boys and young men, but there is no evidence of any later misconduct.
- 2005, Carol Weiss Lewis, Stuart Gilman, The ethics challenge in public service: a problem-solving guide, 2 edition, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, →ISBN, page 88:
- Entire books have been written about the role of scandal in US politics (Garment, 1992). Offenses include smoking marijuana, hiring illegal aliens, plagiarizing, sexually harassing others, engaging in pedophilia, […]
- 2007, Oppenheimer, Todd, “Read All about It -- but Where, Exactly?”, in SFGate, Hearst Communications:
- It's quite another (a bad idea) to expect amateurs to figure out who is telling the truth about Iraq, or which priests have committed pedophilia.
- For more quotations using this term, see Citations:pedophilia.
Usage notes
- Many psychologists recommend against using the term pedophilia to denote sexual activities with children, because not all people with a primary or exclusive sexual attraction to prepubescent children (i.e., pedophilia) commit such acts, and child molesters often lack a strong sexual interest in prepubescent children.[1][2] Furthermore, psychological texts define pedophilia as a primary or exclusive attraction towards specifically prepubescent children;[3] primary attraction towards pubescent children is known as hebephilia and towards post-pubescent adolescents as ephebophilia. See Wikipedia for more information.
Related terms
- pedophile
- pedophiliac
- pedophilic
Translations
sexual feeling or desire by adults towards children
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(medicine) sexual feeling or desire by adults or older adolescents towards prepubescent children
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sexual acts between adults and children
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- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Translations to be checked
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References
- Seto, Michael (2008). Pedophilia and Sexual Offending Against Children. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. p. vii.
- Lanning, Kenneth V. (2010). Child Molesters: A Behavioral Analysis (fifth ed.). National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. pp. 29–30 (45–46 of PDF).
- American Psychiatric Association, ed. (2013). Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (fifth ed.). American Psychiatric Publishing. p. 697.