You want to know something scary? Some studies estimate that one out of every hundred men could experience sexual feelings towards minors. Let’s do the maths quick. You have 800 Facebook friends, 400 are men…yeah, not a pleasant thought hey. Start your suspicion engines now.

But is there a certain ‘look’ that is typical of those who hand out sweets outside of playgrounds?

(I hear your cries of ‘outdated’ paedo. I’m willing to bet most of today’s grooming takes place online and at the BBC too).

Dr. Sarah Goode, author of Paedophiles in Society, spoke to Vice about why we have this idea of what a ‘typical’ paedophile might look like:

I think we half-realize that sexual attraction to kids is potentially there in people who look just like us,” said Dr. Goode. “The problem is, that knowledge makes us so uncomfortable [that] we prefer to pretend it’s ‘those weird monsters over there.

There may be some physiological differences though, as research has shown that male paedophiles have far less white matter than usual, which is the tissue responsible for communication between different parts of the brain. Another fun fact, this from Vice again:

[Dr. James Cantor] also found that pedophiles (sic) tend to be shorter than average in height, and are three times more likely to be left-handed or ambidextrous.

It’s not all doom and gloom mostly left-handed, yet ambidextrous people out there beginning to sweat from the brow. Dr. Cantor did say the findings can’t be used for any kind of accurate criminal profiling.

Still, that mate of yours Dodgy Dave seems like a strange cat doesn’t he? One in every hundred…

[source:vice]