Presenter: Maja Feng Mikalsen, Norwegian Police University College, and Department of Sociology and Human Geography, University of Oslo, majmik@phs.no

Chair: Ossy Riviani Bradbury, Norwegian Police University College, ossy.riviani.bradbury@phs.no

Grooming: Phenomenon and Holistic Consequences Frequent use of digital technologies and digital communication provides new opportunities for deceptive crime on a larger scale. Prior literature and cases show that relational access and sexual and/or economic exploitation is achieved in various forms of deceptive crime like “online sexual grooming” (OSG) in “online child sexual exploitation and abuse” (OCSEA) and “online dating romance frauds and scams” (ODRFS). The phenomenon of grooming or online grooming, can refer to a social preparatory process whereby the person (child, adolescent, adult or older) is emotionally manipulated by an adult for sexual and/or economic purposes using cyber-technology. The consequences for the victims and society, as well as the perpetrators, may be enduring and severe.

The aim of this article-based PhD project is to gain more research-based knowledge about (online) grooming, both its phenomenology and to explore potential ways to quantify the harms of deceptive crime. I plan to employ mixed methods in the following manner:

Topic 1: A scoping review on online dating romance frauds and scams. This ongoing study aims to provide an overview of research on grooming in ODRFS. Moreover, a literature review on online sexual grooming of children and adolescents is presented as a conference poster presentation at Eurocrim 2023.

Topic 2: An in-depth study into severe forms of deceptive crime. I plan to conduct qualitative research interviews, covering assumed key aspects of grooming processes. Criteria for participation are personal experience with either OCSEA or ODRFS, as victims or perpetrators.

Topic 3: The prevalence and frequency of severe forms of deceptive crime and estimating the consequences of grooming. The actual prevalence of the two forms of deceptive crime is challenging to measure as it is related to the means of deception. Moreover, feelings of shame and victim blaming discourses in society have an impact on the estimated prevalence. I will search official documentation (statistics of reported crime), as well as snowballing methods (newspapers and social media) to assess the occurrence of victims and perpetrators of either forms of deceptive crime. Furthermore, I plan to estimate the consequences (human and economic) of the two forms of deceptive crime. Data sources may be based on statistics on e.g., register data, police- and court cases, possibly a survey, as well as what is possible to gain of information from the participants linked to the first two research topics Maja Feng Mikalsen is a Sociologist, a PhD candidate at the Norwegian Police University College in Oslo, and an externally funded PhD candidate at the Department of Sociology and Human Geography at the University of Oslo. Her research topics are crime prevention, (online) grooming, social inequality, diversity and inclusion, and discrimination. She is currently working on her PhD project: “Grooming: phenomenon and holistic consequences”, funded by the Ministry of Justice and Public Security (JD)/the National Police Directorate (POD).

Maja Feng Mikalsen is a Sociologist, a PhD candidate at the Norwegian Police University College in Oslo, and an externally funded PhD candidate at the Department of Sociology and Human Geography at the University of Oslo. Her research topics are crime prevention, (online) grooming, social inequality, diversity and inclusion, and discrimination. She is currently working on her PhD project: “Grooming: phenomenon and holistic consequences”, funded by the Ministry of Justice and Public Security (JD)/the National Police Directorate (POD).