5WAVES launched siblingsexualtrauma.com in January 2022. It was, and still is, the world’s only comprehensive website devoted specifically to sibling sexual abuse and trauma. Brandy began writing it in 2021, in response to the lack of information she found online when her family needed it most.
Now that the site exists, who is visiting it? What can we learn from who is visiting and what they are clicking? The data below are collected from Google search console and Wix dashboard reports covering the past full year, June 2022-June 2023.
There is demand: 45,830 unique viewers have visited the site in the past year. Visitors are currently averaging nearly 6000 per month.
The need is worldwide: Visits have originated from 168 countries, on every continent.
There is interest in all categories of people affected: Of those visitors who clicked on one of the four main portals for type of person involved:
41% selected the survivors/victims portal,
28% selected the parents portal (including 14% who visited a blog written for parents of adult children),
22% selected the portal for people who have sexually harmed a sibling, and
7% selected the professionals portal.
Site visitors’ top question, overwhelmingly: Where is the Line? What is normal and what’s harmful when it comes to sibling sexual behavior?
Sibling Sexual Abuse vs. Normal Curiosity: Where's the Line? is by far the most-visited page on the site, with over ⅓ of site visitors clicking on this page.
Of those who find the site through Google, four times as many click on Where’s the Line as the next-most-clicked match.
Top Google searches that lead visitors to click on the site include the words normal, inappropriate, experimentation, curious, touching–words that suggest questions, confusion, and possibly guilt about behavior that has happened.
A solid second concern: What Do I Do Now?
Do I Have to Report My Own Child? is the next most sought and clicked page. (A smaller number click on Should I Report It?, which is written for adult survivors.)
A top phrase in Google searches leading to the site was “What do I do if…”
Many site visitors sought information about system responses, including criminal justice, child protection, and the sex offender registry
People need help, and they need help finding help. They visited pages with information on peer support, finding healing and therapy, and how to manage supporting both children.
Question #3 may be surprising for those who have never asked it themselves: Did This Really Happen to Me?
Did It Really Happen | Survivors was visited 3.5 times as often as Who Do I Believe | Parents
Combined with pages dealing with Trauma and Memory, Did It Really Happen to Me? is the third-most-searched topic on the site
This suggests that experiencing a sibling’s abusive sexual behavior is particularly likely to result in coping by dissociation.
Even those who remember what happened may wonder: It's Not a Big Deal--Is It???
Concerns about how to manage safety and risk and family relationships form the next tier. This includes pages such as:
How to find treatment for problematic sexual behavior and support the sibling who caused harm
Attempting to understand why it happened and what is the risk going forward
At this writing, 898 unique viewers have visited the page: Am I a Monster? and 793 have visited Taking Responsibility
What language do visitors use to find the site?
“Abuse” is the most-searched term that leads visitors to the site
Neutral terms such as “touch” or “behavior” are next
Other less commonly searched terms include trauma, incest, molestation, rape, and assault
But–what are even more people searching for?
The number of searches that end in clicks on siblingsexualtrauma.com is dwarfed by the number of searches that appear to be seeking sibling porn.
Searches for porn far outnumber searches related to abuse.
Child exposure to online porn is a leading risk factor for children to sexually harm their siblings or other children.
More to come on our next blog post–scroll up to subscribe.