Despite 30-40% of child sex abusers using grooming behaviours to coerce their victims, there is no universal definition for the term ‘grooming’ or ‘sexual grooming.’
This surprises me when we have very clear definitions for other crimes such as rape, murder, theft and fraud.
Think about it: no matter where you are in the world, murder is murder, and theft is theft.
But sexual grooming isn’t like that.
We can’t even agree on a definition of sexual grooming within the same country, let alone globally.
It appears that the very term of ‘grooming’ is just as manipulative as the perpetrators who conduct these behaviours. It doesn’t seem to want to be pinned down and ousted as one thing or another.
In this post, we are going to look at 4 different definitions of the term ‘sexual grooming‘ and discuss what is good and not so great about each definition.
Sexual Grooming – Definition 1
Let’s start with the definition of sexual grooming from the Metropolitan Police (2024):
‘Grooming is when a person builds a relationship with a child, young person or an adult who’s at risk so they can abuse them and manipulate them into doing things. The abuse is usually sexual or financial, but it can also include other illegal acts. Grooming can take place online or in person and it can happen over a short or long period – from days to years.’
What’s Good About This Definition:
- It defines grooming as an action that can happen to both children and adults. Moreover, the definition separates those under 18 years old into two groups; ‘child’ and ‘young person.’ We often think of a ‘child’ as being of primary school age, but, as I keep saying (and will continue to say throughout this book), you are legally a child until your 18th birthday.
- Using the term ‘young person’ reminds us that teens are affected by grooming just as much as younger children are.
- It considers how grooming is not always sexually motivated.
- It includes a timeframe which shows how grooming can be as quick or slow a process as the groomer wants or needs it to be.
What’s Not Great About This Definition:
- It doesn’t consider post-abuse maintenance from the perpetrator to ensure the victim doesn’t tell anyone about the abuse.
- The phrase ‘who’s at risk’ creates the thought process that not everyone is at risk of being a victim of grooming or sexual offences. The reality is that anyone could be a victim of grooming.
Sexual Grooming – Definition 2
Another definition of sexual grooming that I came across comes from Winters et al. (2021). They proposed to define sexual grooming as:
‘…the deceptive process used by sexual abusers to facilitate sexual contact with a minor while simultaneously avoiding detection. Prior to the commission of the sexual abuse, the would-be sexual abuser may select a victim, gain access to and isolate the minor, develop trust with the minor and often their guardians, community, and youth-serving institutions, and desensitise the minor to sexual content and physical contact. Post-abuse, the offender may use maintenance strategies on the victim to facilitate future sexual abuse and/or to prevent disclosure.’
What’s Good About This Definition:
- This is probably the most thorough definition that I came across and goes as far as to identify how the perpetrator will gain trust from those around the victim. The perpetrator does this so that those around the victim don’t pick up on grooming behaviours.
- It specifies that the perpetrator acts in a manipulative way to hide their intentions.
- It states that desensitisation to touch may appear innocent. For example, hugging by way of a greeting. However, this ‘innocent’ touching will gradually build up to more sexualised contact.
- It mentions post-abuse contact. This is the only definition that I found which did mention the post-abuse phase of grooming. After the initial abuse, post-abuse acts of manipulation ensure that the victim does not disclose any abuse, and if they do, that they won’t be believed. The importance of post-abuse contact cannot be overlooked. This demonstrates that grooming is an ongoing process.
What’s Not Great About This Definition:
- ‘Post-abuse’ creates the illusion that once abuse has occurred, this is the end of the process. However, groomers and sexual offenders will often re-offend (often with the same victim) once they know that they have got away with their actions.
Sexual Grooming – Definition 3
A further definition of sexual grooming was put forward by Lanning (2017):
‘The term grooming generally refers to specific nonviolent techniques used by some child molesters to gain access to and control of their child victims. The techniques a child molester employs are most influenced by the relationship between the offender and the victim. Although acquaintance child molesters are sometimes violent, to avoid discovery, they tend to control their victims primarily through this seduction or grooming process.’
What’s Good About This Definition:
- It supports that grooming techniques are used to control victims.
- It discusses how the perpetrator will use their knowledge of the victim to groom them. In short, a perpetrator will adjust their grooming tactics based on their knowledge of their victim.
- It notes that grooming behaviours can be violent or non-violent but acknowledges that most grooming behaviours and tactics are non-violent. This contradicts much of the child safeguarding training I’ve attended and seen where professionals are encouraged to look for very physical signs that abuse is taking place. However, as pointed out by Lanning (2010), the use of non-violent techniques to groom a victim is intentional. This is because the use of physical violence increases the likelihood of the perpetrator’s acts being discovered.
What’s Not Great About This Definition:
- It talks about groomers as ‘child molesters’ rather than as sexual offenders as a wider circle. Child molesters are a more specific type of sex offender. Therefore, people using the definition may not see how it relates to sexual offenders as a whole.
Sexual Grooming – Definition 4
A final definition that we will look at is provided by Whittle et al. (2013) who describe sexual grooming as:
‘a technique to help turn a sex offender’s fantasy into reality, whether online or offline.’
What’s Good About This Definition:
- It’s only the second of the definitions to refer to online abuse as well as offline abuse. We know that online grooming is becoming more and more prevalent. But we need to remember that grooming happens in both the online and the non-virtual worlds.
- Because it explains how the purpose of grooming is to take a perpetrator’s fantasy and turn it into reality, this definition supports the notion that grooming is a pre-mediated, planned behaviour and not a random act of impulse.
What’s Not Great About This Definition:
- It’s very brief and doesn’t consider the actual process of grooming.
- It doesn’t consider the profile of the victim in terms of age, interests, appearance, etc.
- It lacks the element of control exhibited by groomers, and that comes with grooming behaviours.
Final Thoughts
Whilst all four of these definitions bring key points to the conversation of what sexual grooming is, they all have slight differences and areas of key focus, and despite them all having the same underlying, common theme, none of the definitions are exactly alike. Instead, all of these definitions consider sexual grooming behaviours from slightly different angles.
This lack of a universal definition for sexual grooming only makes it harder for people to properly understand what it is.
After all, if we can’t define what grooming is, how can we expect people to spot the signs of it and protect themselves or others from it?
This post is adapted from a section of It's All Your Fault - due for release in 2025.
