Sex Trafficking in the United States: A Scoping Review

Abstract

Purpose: Human trafficking is a public health social work issue. This review aimed to present the current state (nature and extent) of sex trafficking research, categorize best practices, and identify recommendations for professionals.

Methods: Comprehensive literature searches of online databases were conducted to identify eligible articles from January 2000 to March 2019.

Results: The search yielded 467 studies, 87 met the predetermined criteria for inclusion. Seven themes identified: awareness, identification, at-risk populations, health issues, implementation of trafficking legislation, service and program implementation, and exploiters.

Discussion and implications for practice: Findings indicate the need for additional research to determine the most effective practices to increase awareness and identification, widespread TVPA implementation, reduce risk factors and resulting health disparities, offer services to survivors and prevention of potential victims.

Conclusion: There should be significant efforts to enhance all sex trafficking research in the United States to implement effective, sustainable and evidence-based interdisciplinary interventions.

Keywords: Sex trafficking; commercial sex; evidence-based; human trafficking; public health; scoping review; social work.