The solution to dealing with child sex abuse and teenage violence lies in the home and prevention -- rather than cure -- has to start in childhood.

That was the message from experts conducting a workshop on these issues last week.

And the participants at the workshop, which ended on Friday, drew up an action plan to help curb youth violence in Bermuda.

Solutions included bringing back truancy officers, supplying parenting classes for young parents, providing positive male role models for fatherless children and instilling discipline and proper values in young children. The suggestions came as around 75 professionals in the field -- including two US experts -- met students to draw up measures to combat child sex abuse and teen violence.

Fatu Songowa and Debra Reed are directors of the House of Ruth Domestic Violence Crisis Program in Washington, which offers emergency housing and services to families affected by domestic violence.

And both said statistics collected by the US Census Bureau backed up the need for change. They noted that: One in three girls are sexually abused before the age of 18; and One in six boys are sexually abused by the time they are 16 years old.

But Bermudian figures on abuse contained in a recent Task Force on Child Abuse report were almost as grim.

The study, which focused on more than two-thirds of the Island's fifth year high school students (17 years or younger), showed that: One in five students (21.9 percent) reported that an adult had touched them in a sexual manner; Three in five students (59 percent) reported the person identified as responsible for attempting to get them to sexually touch the adult was a family member; and One in twelve students (8.6 percent) reported having sex with an adult.

The special two-day conference, which finished yesterday, was sponsored by the Physical Abuse Centre.

Two workshops -- on physical and sexual abuse of teens and teen violence -- were conducted by the visiting social workers.

But -- despite the fact that teen violence stems from a number of factors like poverty, drug abuse, inadequate police protection and lenient courts -- the experts said teen involvement and parents were the key to fighting violence among youngsters.

Ms Songowa said: "Communication inside the family is key. There has to be a level of honesty in the communication.

"The number one ingredient to empowering parents is to praise the good in children. Focus on the positive, not the negative things kids do.

"Attention is what this is all about. That's why the rich have some of the same problems as the poor.'' And Ms Songowa advised busy parents to make the little time they spent with their children count.

Ms Reed also pointed out that teenage involvement was vital in dealing with youth violence.

She said: "All the successful programmes in the US, the kids are running them and we just facilitate them. Kids have to learn how to be the masters of their own minds and how to control themselves when someone pushes all their buttons.

They have to be taught to be responsible for their own actions.'' She said the community needed to convince "the powers that be'' to address the needs of young people.

"You need to convince the people with the power that there are benefits other than financial ones which are gained by addressing the needs of the young,'' Ms Songowa said.

Sexual abuse, particularly among teens and children, was spotlighted during the first day of the workshops.

Ms Songowa told participants that while sexual abuse cut across social barriers, it was still a subject people avoided.

But she said: "Sexual abuse is a human element, it does not affect just one group of people. It happens to the rich and the poor. It's universal.'' Ms Reed added: "It is not a comfortable issue, but it has to be addressed. We have been too quiet about this for too long as a society. It happens to boys and girls. Even infants are sexually abused.'' Ms Reed said the effects of sexual abuse on children were devastating and long-lasting.

"Certain things that happen to you, you will always have with you,'' she said. "It will always be there, even after you get help. It will be a day-to-day struggle you will have to deal with the rest of your life.'' Common psychological effects of childhood sexual abuse included depression, an inability to trust and aggressive or self-destructive behaviour, she added.

Ms Reed also pointed out that sexual abuse changed the victim's personality and destroyed his or her self-image.

Noting that a child learns most during the first three years of life and begins to develop his or her personality, she said: "How you feel about yourself develops from your relationships with people.

"As a child you are starting to develop a picture of yourself and form your personality, but sexual abuse tears up that picture you have had of yourself.

It is destroyed.'' "Sexual abuse somehow freezes people in their developmental process,'' Ms Songowa added. "When it has happened to someone, that person usually acts at the age level they were when the abuse occurred.'' Although victims never forget the abuse, the experts stressed early treatment.

Ms Songowa said: "We have noticed from our programme that intervention worked better for those at an early age than for those who waited longer to get help.

It is harder to intervene when they are at the teenage level. There is a resilience in children.'' The pair said although finding physical evidence of abuse was difficult, observing the behaviour patterns of children was the best way to identify abused children.

Childhood symptoms of sexual abuse include, a change in school performance like school phobia, a return to regressive behaviour such as thumbsucking, and sleep disturbance like night terrors.

"If a child draws a picture of their family and their parents are on one side of the page and the child alone or hiding, there may be something going on in that home,'' Ms Songowa warned.

Adolescent symptoms include impulsive behaviour like running away from home, eating disorders, and suicide attempts.

Ms Songowa said: "If a child constantly tries to hide their body under layers of clothes, they may be trying to hide themselves from something.'' And the pair reminded participants that a child could never give consent to a sexual relationship.

"It is important to remember there can be no consensual sexual relationship between an adult, or someone significantly older, and a child,'' Ms Songowa stressed. "It is also important to distinguish between a child's cooperation and their consent. How do kids distinguish and understand the boundaries?'' CHILDREN CLD ABUSE HTH