Perceived Effectiveness of Help and Deterrence Messaging for CSAM - a Four Country Study

This is the third of three linked studies focusing on help-seeking for online sexual behaviour involving children. The first registration (osf.io) introduced a screening phase whereby we surveyed participants from the UK and US (representative samples) as well as South Africa and Mexico (sex-balanced samples). The survey included questions about past online sexual behaviour including potentially illegal or grey area behaviours relating to children as well as attraction to online child sexual exploitation and abuse behaviours (OCSEA). The pre-registration relating to that survey described broadly descriptive analyses and some exploratory analyses to be conducted with those data from the first study. The second registration (osf.io) described a follow-up study of those participants (plus some additional US and UK participants recruited to reach target sample size). That follow-up was designed to test a previously-developed model to explain help-seeking intention and self-reported perceptions of need to seek help for harmful sexual behaviour. Followed up participants were those who had indicated past illegal or grey area behaviour or an attraction to online child exploitation and abuse. In this third study we will provide an opportunity to all participants who took part in the second registered study to participate in one final study, this time focusing on these participants' perceptions of which messages are most effective for deterrence, help-seeking, and reporting of CSAM. Different messages have been developed and refined over a series of non-registered studies. The core research question for this study is to test whether different messages are awarded different ranks in terms of their perceived effectiveness. We will test whether trends in rankings have been consistent across studies. We will also examine demographic and psychological predictors of variation in ranking. Participants may complete the study in English or in Spanish