There are also situations where the terms are misused to refer to relationships where the younger person is an adult of legal age, but is either considered too young in comparison to their older partner, or the older partner occupies a position of authority over them. Researchers state that the above uses of the term pedophilia are imprecise or suggest that they are best avoided. The Mayo Clinic states that pedophilia "is not a criminal or legal term". Pedophile advocacy groups
From the late 1950s to early 1990s, several pedophile membership organizations advocated age of consent reform to lower or abolish age of consent laws, as well as for the acceptance of pedophilia as a sexual orientation rather than a psychological disorder, and for the legalization of child pornography. The efforts of pedophile advocacy groups did not gain mainstream acceptance, and today those few groups that have not dissolved have only minimal membership and have ceased their activities other than through a few websites. In contrast to these organizations, members of the support group Virtuous Pedophiles believe that child sexual abuse is wrong and seek to raise awareness that some pedophiles do not offend; this is generally not considered pedophile advocacy, as the Virtuous Pedophiles organization does not approve of the legalization of child pornography and does not support age of consent reform. Anti-pedophile activism
Anti-pedophile activism encompasses opposition against pedophiles, against pedophile advocacy groups, and against other phenomena that are seen as related to pedophilia, such as child pornography and child sexual abuse.
They state that non-pedophilic offenders tend to offend at times of stress; have a later onset of offending; and have fewer, often familial, victims, while pedophilic offenders often start offending at an early age; often have a larger number of victims who are frequently extrafamilial; are more inwardly driven to offend; and have values or beliefs that strongly support an offense lifestyle. One study found that pedophilic molesters had a median of 1.3 victims for those with girl victims and 4.4 for those with boy victims. Child molesters, pedophilic or not, employ a variety of methods to gain sexual access to children. Some groom their victims into compliance with attention and gifts, while others use threats, alcohol or drugs, or physical force. History
Pedophilia is believed to have occurred in humans throughout history, but was not formally named, defined or studied until the late 19th century. The term paedophilia erotica was coined in an 1886 article by the Viennese psychiatrist Richard von Krafft-Ebing but does not enter the authors Psychopathia Sexualis until the 10th German edition. A number of authors anticipated Krafft-Ebings diagnostic gesture. In Psychopathia Sexualis, the term appears in a section titled "Violation of Individuals Under the Age of Fourteen", which focuses on the forensic psychiatry aspect of child sexual offenders in general. Krafft-Ebing describes several typologies of offender, dividing them into psychopathological and non-psychopathological origins, and hypothesizes several apparent causal factors that may lead to the sexual abuse of children.Krafft-Ebing mentioned paedophilia erotica in a typology of "psycho-sexual perversion".