292 - The role of informal supports in exiting commercial sexual exploitation: A heart condition

Abstract Information: In 2022, Sacramento’s Community Against Sexual Harm (CASH) and their research collaborators, RTI International, presented a final report on estimating sex trafficking in Sacramento County . The report concluded that 13,079 victims were trafficked for sex between 2015 and 2020. This figure was over ten times more than the numbers law enforcement and service providers estimated. The United Nations (UN) reminds us of the gendered nature of sex trafficking, estimating that globally, 96% of victims are female, with up to three-quarters of them children . The CASH study estimated the number of minors trafficked in Sacramento County to be 1,620, or 12.4% of the total number of victims. Victimization length is variable; some may have been trafficked for a couple of days, while others for the full five years of the study. Some may have entered as children and come of age while being trafficked. A quarter of the trafficked women in a recent study had been trafficked up to three times. Relationships play varied and critical functions throughout the trafficked experience, encompassing both entrapment and the process of exiting. Women are groomed and snared through relational and material experiences. Three of the six barriers to exiting identified in the CASH research were relational, threats to loved ones, romantic attachment, and having no other personal relationships to rely upon. In contrast, family and friends were described as “overwhelmingly” significant for women exiting. Relationships have been described as part of a chain of protective factors. These interpersonal relationships are frequently described as informal supports in the literature and, more colloquially, as natural supports. Whoever these people are, they help women leave and stay out, providing a sense of connection, a sense of self-worth, and often the ongoing social support essential to recovery. Efforts to find literature exploring the experiences of informal supports have been unsuccessful and the absence of academic material and information has motivated this participatory research study . The data collection approach will be qualitative, connecting with persons who provide(d) informal support and conducting interviews using a structured questionnaire. It aims to give voice to those who engage in informal supports, to learn about what sustained and motivated their relationships, to explore how they helped, and to ask about their personal experience and what might have been helpful to them. The research findings will inform practice and intervention design to further assist these informal supports in their important work as they remain key to offering protection for trafficked persons, and often facilitate exiting.