Stranger Danger Fears
Only a tiny minority of kidnapped children are taken by strangers. Between 1990 and 1995 the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children handled only 515 stranger abductions, 3.1 percent of its caseload. A 2000 report by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Programs reported that more than
3/4 of kidnappings were committed by family members or acquaintances of the child. The study also found that children abducted by strangers were harmed less frequently than those taken by acquaintances.
In fact, children are in far more danger of being abused, kidnapped or killed by their parents than any stranger on the street. In national surveys conducted in recent years 3 out of 4 parents say they fear that their child will be kidnapped by a stranger. They harbor this anxiety, no doubt, because they keep hearing frightening statistics and stories about perverts snatching children off the street. What the public doesnt hear often or clearly enough is that the majority of missing children are runaways fleeing from physically or emotionally abusive parents.
Child abductions are a real threat, but the risk should be kept in perspective to avoid unnecessarily alarming parents and children. In his book
Protecting the Gift, child-safety expert Gavin De Becker pointed out that compared to a stranger kidnapping, child is vastly more likely to have a heart attack, and child heart attacks are so rare that most parents (correctly) never even consider the risk.
http://news.discovery.com/human/psychology/stranger-child-abductions-actually-very-rare-130514.htm