Maternal language input and child maltreatment

This study examined the language input of mothers to their infants in three groups of mother-infant dyads: abuse, neglect, and adequate. The speech of the 10 mothers in each group was coded for well-formedness, complexity, sentence type, and accepting and rejecting content. In comparison with the neglect group mothers, the adequate group mothers spoke to their infants much more: The adequate group mothers produced more complete grammatical utterances and used more indirect imperatives and acceptance phrases than did the neglect group mothers. There were relatively few differences on the linguistic measures between the adequate and abuse group mothers. On the content measures, the abuse group mothers were more rejecting than either the adequate or neglect group mothers.     

Treatment of co-occurring child maltreatment and substance abuse

Despite high prevalence and severe negative consequences of child maltreatment (e.g., Brown, G. R., & Anderson, B., (1991). Psychiatric morbidity in adult inpatients with childhood histories of sexual and physical abuse. American Journal of Psychiatry, 148, 55–61; Jaudes, P. K., Ekwo, E., & Van Voorhis, J.V., (1995). Association of drug abuse and child abuse. Child Abuse and Neglect, 19, 1065–1075; Murphy, J. M., Jellinek, M., Quinn, D., Smith, G., & Goshkom, M., (1991). Substance abuse and serious child mistreatment: Prevalence, risk, and outcome in a court sample. Child Abuse and Neglect, 15, 197—211), the treatment of perpetrators and victims of child abuse and neglect remains grossly understudied (Behl, L. E., Conyngham, H. A., & May, P. F., (2003). Trends in child maltreatment literature. Child Abuse and Neglect, 27, 215–229). More than half of parentes founded for the abuse and neglect of their children have evidenced drug abuse, yet no treatments have been validated that concurrently address these problems. The reciprocal interaction between substance abuse and child maltreatment supports the need to concurrently treat these problems. This article illustrates the relationship between child maltreatment and parental substance abuse and proposes a behavioral model to explain the reciprocal influence of drug abuse and child maltreatment. A behavioral treatment plan that is designed to concurrently address drug abuse and child abuse is proposed and suggestions are made for future directions in this area.     

Defining child maltreatment: ratings of parental behaviors

This study investigated adolescents' assessment of various forms of child abuse and neglect. Participants (N = 204) rated the seriousness of vignettes describing a variety of parental actions relative to the degree of harm each was perceived to have on a child's welfare. Adolescents' responses were compared to those of community members and professionals as reported by Giovannoni and Becerra (1979). Results indicated that adolescents were somewhat similar to community members in their ratings; however, they were more severe in their judgments of parenting behaviors on 52 of the 65 items. As a group, adolescents were very critical of the parents' actions, suggesting that they are highly idealistic regarding parental treatment of children and may maintain inappropriate expectations for those responsible for raising children.     

Child Protection Services caseworkers' assessment of child maltreatment severity

The goals of this research were to explore accuracy and consistency in the assessment of child maltreatment severity in Spanish Child Protection Services (CPS) and the influence of caseworker's service, gender, professional discipline, degree of dedication to CPS, and years of experience on the accuracy of the assessment of maltreatment severity. Two studies were conducted with 515 and 168 caseworkers from two Spanish CPSs. Case vignettes were used. Caseworkers of both groups were asked to rate severity of the assigned case vignettes, applying the criteria used in their daily work. Caseworkers in both studies obtained low levels of accurate ratings. None of the total vignettes obtained a percentage higher than 80% of inter-rater agreement. No significant relationships were found between accuracy of ratings and caseworkers' service, gender, professional discipline, degree of dedication to CPS, and years of experience.     

Physical maltreatment victim to antisocial child: evidence of an environmentally mediated process

The well-documented finding that child physical maltreatment predicts later antisocial behavior has at least 2 explanations: (a). Physical maltreatment causes antisocial behavior, and (b). genetic factors transmitted from parents to children influence the likelihood that parents will be abusive and that children will engage in antisocial behavior. The authors tested these hypotheses in the representative Environmental-Risk cohort of 1116 twin pairs and their families, who were assessed when the twins were 5 and 7 years old. Mothers reported on children's experience of physical maltreatment, and mothers and teachers reported on children's antisocial behavior. The findings support the hypothesis that physical maltreatment plays a causal role in the development of children's antisocial behavior and that preventing maltreatment can prevent its violent sequelae.     

Role of foster family belonging in recovery from child maltreatment

Research on foster care suggests that children who have experienced abuse are susceptible to a range of negative life outcomes. Such research also suggests that children removed into foster care can recover from abuse if given opportunities to develop healing relationships with caregivers. Drawing on qualitative data from a national research project on Australian foster carers, this paper explores how foster families enact forms of belonging that potentially work to ameliorate experiences of abuse among foster children. With a specific focus on experiences of family solidarity, rituals, identity, and culture among foster carers and the children in their care, the findings highlight the role that foster carers can play in contributing to national child protection agendas aimed at addressing experiences of maltreatment among children removed into care in Australia.     

Age of onset of child maltreatment predicts long-term mental health outcomes

The authors tested the hypothesis that children who are maltreated earlier in life are at greater risk for poor psychological functioning in adulthood than those maltreated later in life. Age of onset of maltreatment was assessed with 3 classifications: (a) continuous (ages 0-11 years); (b) dichotomous (early [ages 0-5 years] vs. later [ages 6-11 years]); and (c) developmental (infancy [ages 0-2 years], preschool [ages 3-5 years], early school age [ages 6-8 years], and school age [ages 9-11 years]). Individuals with documented cases of physical and sexual abuse and neglect prior to age 12 (N=496) were followed up and assessed in adulthood. Results indicated that an earlier onset of maltreatment, measured dichotomously and developmentally, predicted more symptoms of anxiety and depression in adulthood, while controlling for gender, race, current age, and other abuse reports. Later onset of maltreatment, measured continuously or developmentally, was predictive of more behavioral problems in adulthood. Implications for the assessment of maltreated children, the prevention of adult psychopathology, and the classification of age of maltreatment onset are discussed.     

An assessment of the extent of child maltreatment using administrative databases

This study examined the extent of violence toward children and factors associated with child maltreatment in Florida using a cohort of children (N=499,330) who were adjudged to be victims of maltreatment between July 1, 1996, and June 30, 2003. To assess the extent of maltreatment, five indicators were proposed and examined. Multivariate analyses found that prior referral, having more than one type of maltreatment during an initial incident, and caregiver absence best predicted the recurrence of maltreatment. Caregivers' alcohol and substance use were strong predictors of neglect and threatened harm but not of abuse. Finally, multilevel analyses found that older, nonminority girls with histories of prior referrals were significantly (psuedo-zs>2.00) more likely to experience high degrees of incident severity. Caregivers' substance use, excluding alcohol, also was significantly linked to incident severity. Implications of the findings are discussed.     

The role of the environment in the etiology of child maltreatment

The role of the environment in the etiology of child maltreatment has long been debated. Child protection activities have typically focused on the character of alleged perpetrators to the virtual exclusion of the broad social context in which abuse and neglect occurs. Evidence of the stressful effects of environmental circumstance on adults in disadvantaged families is substantial. Overwhelming social forces that act on parents with few resources or skills with which to cope and adapt can produce violent tendencies that lead to the mistreatment of their children. There is established theory to guide the design and implementation of programs sensitive to the potentially strong environmental influence of the behavior of abusive and neglectful family members.     

Risk factors in child maltreatment: A meta-analytic review of the literature

This review presents the results of a series of meta-analyses identifying the relative strength of various risk factors for child physical abuse and neglect. Data from 155 studies examining 39 different risk factors were included in the review. Large effect sizes were found between child physical abuse and three risk factors (parent anger/hyper-reactivity, family conflict and family cohesion). Large effect sizes were also found between child neglect and five risk factors (parent–child relationship, parent perceives child as problem, parent's level of stress, parent anger/hyper-reactivity, and parent self-esteem).     

An approach to the problem of differential prediction

A procedure for maximizing selective efficiency is developed for application to situations in which it is desired to select from a single group of applicants for several possible assignments. The problem of comparable units for the several criteria whose values must be compared to each other for differential assignment purposes is discussed. It is demonstrated that, assuming linear regressions, maximal selection is obtained if individuals in any given assignment are differentiated from those rejected according to critical rejection scores on the multiple weighted sum of the predictors and from another possible assignment by critical difference scores which are merely the differences between the two critical rejection scores. Since the relationships just indicated give no way of determining the magnitude of the critical scores required to select the required number of persons for each assignment, a successive approximation procedure for accomplishing this purpose has been devised and a computational example is worked out.The opinions expressed are those of the author and are not to be construed as official or as those of the War Department.     

Longitudinal associations among child maltreatment, social functioning, and cortisol regulation

Child maltreatment increases the risk for impaired social functioning and cortisol regulation. However, the longitudinal interplay among these factors is still unclear. This study aimed to shed light on the effect of maltreatment on social functioning and cortisol regulation over time. The sample consisted of 236 children (mean age 7.64 years, SD = 1.36; 125 maltreated children and 111 nonmaltreated children, 128 boys and 108 girls) who attended a week-long summer camp for 2 consecutive years. Saliva was collected during 5 days at 9:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m. Means of morning and afternoon cortisol levels and cortisol change (difference between morning and afternoon levels, controlled for morning levels) were used to group the children into low-, medium-, and high-cortisol groups. Prosocial, disruptive/aggressive, and withdrawn behaviors were assessed using information from peers and counselors. Maltreated children showed less prosocial and more disruptive/aggressive and withdrawn behavior. Results of structural equation modeling analyses indicated that there were indirect effects of maltreatment on Year 2 morning cortisol via prosocial and disruptive/aggressive behavior: Lower levels of prosocial behavior and higher levels of disruptive/aggressive behavior were related to lower morning cortisol levels 1 year later. Withdrawn behavior was related to higher afternoon cortisol values 1 year later. Results of this study suggest that maltreated children are more likely to experience difficulties in social functioning, which in turn is related to cortisol regulation 1 year later. This altered hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical (HPA) axis functioning may put children at risk for later psychopathology.     

Psychologists' involvement in cases of child maltreatment. Limits of role and expertise

As psychologists have become increasingly involved in the investigatory and adjudicative phases of child maltreatment cases and as criminal prosecutions have become increasingly common in such cases, the ethical problems facing psychologists have become more acute. Psychologists involved in cases of child maltreatment should remember their primary duty to promote human dignity. In that regard, care must be taken to protect the rights of the various parties, assist the parties to make use of the legal process, and keep implicit or express promises, including those emanating from professional roles. Psychologists must be careful to avoid intruding into the province of legitimate decision-making authorities.     

A synthetic validity approach to testing differential prediction hypotheses

A new method is presented for conducting differential prediction analyses that makes it possible to test differential prediction hypotheses with adequate statistical power even when the sample size within a job or a job family is very small. This method, called synthetic differential prediction analysis, represents an application of the logic of synthetic validation to differential prediction analyses. The authors explain this new method and describe its application in a selection-system validation study conducted in a large organization.     

The limits of child effects: evidence for genetically mediated child effects on corporal punishment but not on physical maltreatment

Research on child effects has demonstrated that children's difficult and coercive behavior provokes harsh discipline from adults. Using a genetically sensitive design, the authors tested the limits of child effects on adult behavior that ranged from the normative (corporal punishment) to the nonnormative (physical maltreatment). The sample was a 1994-1995 nationally representative birth cohort of 1,116 twins and their families who participated in the Environmental Risk Longitudinal Study. Results showed that environmental factors accounted for most of the variation in corporal punishment and physical maltreatment. However, corporal punishment was genetically mediated in part, and the genetic factors that influenced corporal punishment were largely the same as those that influenced children's antisocial behavior, suggesting a child effect. The authors conclude that risk factors for maltreatment are less likely to reside within the child and more likely to reside in characteristics that differ between families.     

Impact of substance abuse and child maltreatment training on service utilization in a rural setting

Substance abuse and child maltreatment have been recognized as co-morbid problems encountered in families presenting in the child protective services (CPS) system. Nonetheless, utilization rates of substance abuse treatment services have generally lagged well behind what the research would suggest are prevalence rates for substance abuse disorders in this population, suggesting problems in recognition and referral practices among CPS workers. In response to this, 25 training programs were funded by the National Center on Child Abuse and Neglect. This study reports data from one program. Trainees indicated a high level of satisfaction and demonstrated significant knowledge gains. More importantly, utilization of substance abuse services increased significantly across time in a multi-county region receiving training relative to a comparison region receiving none. The gain was limited, suggesting that while increased knowledge may translate into increased service utilization, additional barriers to accessing needed services must also be addressed.