CHILDREN who commit sex offences are no different from other juvenile offenders and should not be placed on sex offenders' registers or carry the burden of a criminal record for life, a visiting expert says.

Elizabeth Letourneau, an associate professor in the department of psychiatry and behavioural science at the Medical University of South Carolina, said adolescent sex offenders generally did not go on to commit sex offences as adults.

''These are not short paedophiles,'' she said. ''Adolescent sex crime is not a good predictor of adult sex crime.''

Dr Letourneau was the keynote speaker at a conference last week of the Australian and New Zealand Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abuse. She has lent her voice to proposed changes to the NSW Criminal Records Act that would have juvenile sex offenders freed from the shadow of their history.

The Attorney-General, John Hatzistergos, has asked the Legislative Council's standing committee on law and justice to inquire into a possible amendment to the law. Public hearings began last week.