David Finkelhor

Professor, Sociology Department
University of New Hampshire
Durham, NH  03824
telephone: (603)862-2761
fax: (603)862-1122

E-mail:  david.finkelhor@unh.edu

Office:Horton 126

Office Hours:  By appointment

Courses Taught

Sociology 525: Juvenile Crime and Delinquency
Sociology 650: Family Violence
Sociology773/873: Sociology of Childhood
Sociology 797/897: Research Methods in Crime and Justice

Specialties:

Youth and Crime
Family Violence

Child Maltreatment

Mental Health
Family
Survey Research

Sociological Interests:

David Finkelhor is Director of the Crimes against Children Research Center (CCRC), which is dedicated to studies about the nature and impact of a wide variety of offenses against juveniles, including conventional crimes (e.g. homicide, rape, robbery), child abuse, peer violence, family abductions and the exposure of children to domestic and community violence.  His work in the area has included the first and second National Incidence Studies of Missing, Abducted, Runaway and Thrownaway Children (NISMART), the National Youth Victimization Prevention Study, the Youth Internet Safety Survey, and the National Study of Sexual Abuse in Daycare.

In his current research in this area he is working to develop questionnaires and methodologies suitable for gathering a broad range of crime victimization information across the various stages of childhood.  He is analyzing national data (including National Incidence Based Reporting System and National Crime Victimization Survey Data) for information about crimes against children.  He is also conducting surveys to examine the extent and nature of offenses against youth including the Internet.

Finkelhor has been Co-Director of the Family Research Laboratory (FRL) since 1988, and co-director of the Family Violence Research Program and its National Institute of Mental Health post-doctoral fellowship program.  His research with the FRL has extended to studies of sexual assaults in marriage, family violence against the elderly, and the backgrounds of incestuous fathers.  He is the author of editor of 10 books and over 100 articles on these topics, including the Sourcebook on Child Sexual Abuse (1986) and Nursery Crimes: Sexual Abuse in Daycare (1990).

He has chaired annual FRL Family Violence Research Conferences.