Coercive Control in Commercial Sexual Exploitation: Examining Prevalence and the Pros and Cons of Semi-Structured Interviews Versus Likert-Scale Self-Reports

Abstract

The inclusion of coercion in trafficking law has highlighted the need for a comprehensive, practical, and ecologically valid assessment of coercion. Accordingly, we examined coercive control (CC) using a semi-structured interview (The Brief Interview of Coercive Control [BICC]; Raghavan & Doychak, 2025) and a Likert self-report (The Checklist of Controlling Behaviors [CCB]; Lehmann et al., 2012) to systematically document type, frequency, and severity of CC in a sample of former victims of sex trafficking. CC tactics including surveillance and stalking, microregulation, manipulation, isolation, intimidation (including nonphysical and physical abuse), degradation, deprivation, and sexual abuse/coercion were present in all 68 narratives with over half of the sample feeling afraid and experiencing 5 or more tactics daily. Despite high levels of overall coercion, rates of physical violence were relatively low when compared to other tactics as measured by both the BICC and the CCB. Overall, findings suggest the CC framework can be reliably used to assess the abuses endured in this population. However, differences in findings of CC when using the BICC versus the CCB suggest that although both assessments detected coercion, semi-structured and impact-anchored assessments capture CC victimization more comprehensively than do checklist self-report measures. These findings highlight the importance of considering the costs and benefits of various methodology when assessing or measuring CC.