Psychological treatment of physical maltreatment and negligence in children and adolescents: a meta-analysis

The results of a meta-analysis about the efficacy of psychological treatment for children who have suffered physical maltreatment and neglect by their parents or tutors are presented. Sixteen studies that met our selection criteria were included, providing 22 treated groups and 8 control groups. The results showed an absence of clear differences among the diverse treatments, although all of them exhibited a low-to-medium practical significance. The longer they are, the more effective are the treatments and also when neglect was the type of maltreatment suffered by the children. The effect estimates do not seem to be affected by biases. Finally, the clinical implications of the results, as well as those for future research, are discussed.