Leveraging research to improve prevention and response to abuse in sport Speakers: David Finkelhor, Lisa M. Jones Abuse and exploitation of young athletes has regularly been a disturbing headline in recent years. Despite increasing efforts to establish policies to protect youth, change in practices are slow, and abuse continues. Research has unfortunately also been slow in providing information and guidance to those seeking to improve safety and improve protections for youth and young people. In this presentation, Drs. Jones and Finkelhor will describe information being gathered by the Crimes Against Children Research Center (CCRC) at the University of New Hampshire to better understand what we know about abuse and exploitation in sports and other youth serving organizations. The presentation will draw from victim surveys, case counts, police studies, child welfare studies and examples from other related fields to summarize what we currently know about abuse in sports and where the gaps in knowledge are. The presentation will identify next step efforts needed by sports organizations, policy makers, and researchers to improve our ability to better understand rates of abuse and track changes.