Li Yufang said she had never worried about the safety of her son in terms of sexual assault before news of attacks on boys made headlines in the local newspapers and television in her hometown of Hefei, capital of Anhui province.

Before the reports, the 38-year-old mother of two had no idea that such attacks took place. This lack of parental knowledge and an ingrained attitude that girls are more at risk may mean that some boys and young men are more vulnerable to assault because they've never been taught to recognize the danger signs.

When Li's son was born, her father-in-law, Feng Bing, moved in with the young family to take care of the children. Even though his granddaughter now lives at her school, Feng still has to walk his 10-year-old grandson to and from school.

While sexual assaults on males were a new phenomenon to Li and her husband, they were incomprehensible to the grandfather.

"In my opinion, girls have to be careful when talking to strangers, but who would be interested in sexually assaulting a boy?" said Feng, 56. "That's why I always told my 16-year-old granddaughter not to talk to strangers and even cautioned her about spending time alone in the company of male teachers. I suppose I ignored the education of my grandson in those terms."

However, he didn't know what to say when he tried to talk to the boy. "I constantly tried to avoid using words about sexual harassment in front of my grandson because I thought there was no need and that he was too young to learn about it."

However, at a family meeting the parents decided to tell their son more about sex and the consequences of sexual assault. "What we had learned about was sex education for girls. Neither my husband nor I knew about sexual assault on males and so we had to check for more information," said Li.

The next step was for father-in-law Feng to work out a proper way to explain the situation to the boy. "I understood the definition, but it was really hard to tell him in a subtle way, because we didn't want to talk to him about sex too much," said Feng.

"We're working on it gradually. Giving him little bits of information and not burdening him with too much, too soon. Hopefully, it will help to protect him."

huyongqi@chinadaily.com.cn