Using data from the nationally representative longitudinal Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study, the current study sought to examine associations between neighborhood disorder and physical ...characteristics of the neighborhood at child age three with the likelihood of experiencing physical and psychological abuse and neglect at age five.
Negative binomial regression and zero inflated negative binomial regression models were used to estimate the associations.
Resident perceptions of neighborhood disorder and outside observation of neighborhood physical characteristics were both found to be independently related to the likelihood of physical assault. Resident perceptions were related to psychological aggression. A more positive perception of the neighborhood environment for children (lack of neighborhood disorder) and physical characteristics of the neighborhood were protective against maltreatment. These relationships were not significant for neglect.
Neighborhood environment is a crucial contributor to maltreatment risk. Findings from the present study showed that multiple perceptions of neighborhood quality were associated with lower risk for child physical assault and psychological aggression. Mothers' perceptions of a more positive neighborhood environment were associated with significantly lower physical assault and psychological aggression scores.
•The Protective Factors Survey-2 (PFS-2) is widely used in family program evaluation.•The PFS-2 measures family-level protective factors against child maltreatment.•The PFS-2 was translated into ...Spanish and field-tested with panel data.•The Spanish Protective Factors Survey-2 (SPFS-2) functions similarly to the PFS-2.
The Protective Factors Survey, 2nd Edition (PFS-2) is a validated self-report measure of family-level protective factors against child abuse and neglect that is widely used for program evaluation. To increase its utility to more families and practitioners, the PFS-2 has been translated from English to Spanish. This article provides an overview of the method, including translation and initial results of the Spanish Protective Factor Survey, 2nd Edition (SPFS-2). Using a Qualtrics panel sample (N = 617), we field tested the SPFS-2 with Spanish-speaking respondents from July to August 2019. The findings from this study suggest that the SPFS-2 functions in a similar manner as the PFS-2. Future research seeks to gather feedback from programs serving Spanish-speaking families to revise the tool, and collect data on the SPFS-2 through a field test with the intended population of caregivers participating in services.
•Parents who are at risk of child maltreatment reported positive changes in social-emotional competence of children and parental resilience.•Findings added to the evidence base of Parents as Teachers ...as a strengths-based model to increase protective factors.•Future research should test the mediator effect of changes in PAPF between program participation and reduction in child maltreatment.
As federal policy has prioritized family preservation and maintenance, there is a need to identify programs and interventions that can enhance protective factors among families vulnerable to child maltreatment. This study examines changes in parenting protective factors among parent participants in Parents as Teachers.
Data for this study came from 803 parents who participated in Parents as Teachers as part of Prevention and Early Intervention services in a large Southern state. Parents who completed both pre- and post-surveys of the Parenting Assessment of Protective Factors (PAPF) scale (N = 86) were included for data analysis. We conducted a series of paired t-tests to examine changes in PAPF scores over time. We then conducted a series of linear regressions to explore factors associated with changes in PAPF scores among program participants.
We observed significant increases in all two domains of protective factors, including social connections and overall PAPF score. Parental mental health, and exposure to adverse childhood experiences were associated with resilience and social and emotional competence of children among program participants.
Our findings suggest that participants in Parents as Teachers experienced positive changes in protective factors over the course of the program. Certain parental risk factors were linked to changes in parental resilience and social and emotional competence of children over time. The direction of this relationship varied, highlighting an area for future research to explore how strengths-based programs may be targeted for specific groups.
•Families with screened out child maltreatment reports can be engaged in prevention services.•Case management services reduce re-reports to child protection systems among some families.•Prevention ...services for families screened out of child protection systems vary in effectiveness.
In the mid-2000s, the Wisconsin Child Abuse and Neglect Prevention Board developed an intervention called the Community Response Program (CRP), intended to fill an important gap in the continuum of services to address child maltreatment. Specifically, families reported to child protective services (CPS) for alleged child maltreatment, but diverted (i.e., their cases were screened out at the hotline call stage or closed following an investigation), were offered voluntary case management services tailored to each family’s unique circumstances and self-determined needs. The goal of CRP was to significantly reduce future contacts with the child welfare system within this population.
Beginning in late 2016, seven CRP sites representing 16 Wisconsin counties participated in a randomized control trial to determine the effectiveness of the intervention for reducing CPS involvement. The sample involved families (N = 12,373) diverted from CPS across the program sites. Findings include that CRP staff were able to contact 38% of families in the treatment group, and 12% of families (32% of those contacted) enrolled in the program. CRP participants identified a range of service needs, but over half identified one or more economic needs as service priorities. Just over one-third identified needs related to parenting, and about one quarter identified mental and behavioral health needs. Among participants, over half attained at least one self-determined service goal, and approximately one-quarter attained all of their service goals.
To address selection into treatment, we used propensity score matching techniques to conduct treatment-on-the-treated analyses. Results showed that in some program sites, modest to large declines in child welfare system involvement were observed for the treatment versus the control group, and these declines were much more pronounced and consistent in the subgroup that had a screened-out index report compared to those with an investigated index report. However, in some sites, increases in child welfare system involvement occurred in the treatment group relative to the control group, suggesting that the CRP intervention may not be equally helpful to all families, or requires modifications to enhance success in some sites. The implications of these findings for child maltreatment prevention are discussed.
•The Protective Factors Survey, 2nd Edition measures factors thought to prevent abuse and neglect.•It is designed to support the evaluation of child maltreatment prevention programs.•It can be used ...for needs assessments, programmatic decisions, and case-management.•The present study establishes reliability and validity across diverse samples.
The Protective Factors Survey, 2nd Edition (PFS-2) is designed to support the evaluation of child maltreatment prevention programs. It measures four protective factors thought to be critical in the prevention of abuse and neglect: Family Functioning/Resilience, Nurturing and Attachment, Social Supports, and Concrete Supports. It also measures a fifth component, the Caregiver/Practitioner Relationship, to assess the respondent’s engagement with the program or service being evaluated. In this study, we describe a national field test collecting PFS-2 data across 60 individual program sites in seven states (N = 826). The results from this study indicate that the PFS-2 is a valid, reliable, and stable measure. Implications for the child maltreatment prevention field are discussed.
Early identification of children and families who may benefit from support is crucial for implementing strategies that can prevent the onset of child maltreatment. Predictive risk modeling (PRM) may ...offer valuable and efficient enhancements to existing risk assessment techniques.
To evaluate the PRM's effectiveness against the existing assessment tool in identifying children and families needing home visiting services.
Children born in hospitals affiliated with the Bridges Maternal Child Health Network in Orange County, California, from 2011 to 2016 (N = 132,216).
We developed a PRM tool by integrating a machine learning algorithm with a linked dataset of birth records and child protection system (CPS) records. To align with the existing assessment tool (baseline model), we limited the predicting features to the information used by the existing tool. The need for home visiting services was measured by substantiated maltreatment allegation reported during the first three years of the child's life.
Of the children born in Bridges Network hospitals between 2011 and 2016, 2.7 % experienced substantiated maltreatment allegations by the age of three. Within the top 30 % of children with high-risk scores, the PRM tool outperformed the baseline model, accurately identifying 75.3 %–84.1 % of all children who would experience maltreatment substantiation, surpassing the baseline model's performance of 46.2 %.
Our study underscores the potential of PRM in enhancing the risk assessment tool used by a prevention program in a child welfare center in California. The findings provide valuable insights to practitioners interested in utilizing data for PRM development, highlighting the potential of machine learning algorithms to generate accurate predictions and inform targeted preventive services.
ObjectivesThe Family Nurse Partnership (FNP) is a specialist home-visiting programme for first-time teenage mothers. Developed in the US, short-term outcomes (by age 2 years) were established in ...England in the Building Blocks trial. We used routine data (health, education, social care) linked to our trial cohort to assess longer-term impact.
ApproachMothers recruited to the trial and their first-born children were linked to health (Hospital Episode Statistics/HES: NHS Digital; Abortion statistics: Department of Health and Social Care), education/social care (National Pupil Database/NPD: Department for Education) data in England up to age 7-years. Analysis of data within in a trusted-research environment assessed programme impact upon child maltreatment, child development/educational and maternal life course outcomes when compared to usually provided health and social care support alone. Our primary outcome was child in need registration. Planned sub-group analysis included differential effects by maternal age, deprivation level, care experience and for child outcomes, sex.
ResultsMatch rates for 1547 children were 97.4% (NPD) and 98.3% (HES). We found no difference between trial arms in proportion of children assessed as in need (adjusted odds ratio (aOR) OR:0.98, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.74 to 1.31). Aside from a longer duration in care for children in the usual care arm (two months), there were no other differences in maltreatment outcomes. Children in the FNP arm were more likely to achieve a good level of development at reception age at age 4-5 years (aOR:1.24, 95%CI: 1.01 to 1.52) and, after adjusting for month of birth, to reach the expected standard in reading at Key Stage 1 at age around 7 years (aOR:1.26, 95%CI: 1.02 to 1.57).
ConclusionsWe found programme improvements for child development/educational achievement but not for child maltreatment outcomes. Additional sub-group analysis revealed some evidence of the programme benefiting mothers with greater baseline vulnerability and boys, consistent with previous trials. The study benefits from the linkage of administrative data to a previously randomised trial cohort.
Abstract In recent years there has been an increase in the popularity of home visitation programs as a means of addressing risk factors for child maltreatment. The evidence supporting the ...effectiveness of these programs from several meta-analyses, however, is mixed. One potential explanation for this inconsistency explored in the current study involves the manner in which these programs were implemented. In the current study we reviewed 156 studies associated with 9 different home visitation program models targeted to caregivers of children between the ages of 0 and 5. Meta-analytic techniques were used to determine the impact of 18 implementation factors (e.g., staff selection, training, supervision, fidelity monitoring, etc.) and four study characteristics (publication type, target population, study design, comparison group) in predicting program outcomes. Results from analyses revealed that several implementation factors, including training, supervision, and fidelity monitoring, had a significant effect on program outcomes, particularly child maltreatment outcomes. Study characteristics, including the program's target population and the comparison group employed, also had a significant effect on program outcomes. Implications of the study's results for those interested in implementing home visitation programs are discussed. A careful consideration and monitoring of program implementation is advised as a means of achieving optimal study results.
The global challenge of the neglect of children Kobulsky, Julia M.; Dubowitz, Howard; Xu, Yanfeng
Child abuse & neglect,
December 2020, 2020-12-00, 20201201, Letnik:
110, Številka:
Pt 1
Journal Article
Recenzirano
The neglect of children is a serious global problem. The 1989 United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) was a major international achievement spurring national efforts to prevent and ...address neglect. However, the scope of neglect worldwide and progress in addressing it remain unclear.
This analysis assessed the current state of child neglect through much of the world, including its prevalence and efforts to address it.
The scope of neglect was assessed through a literature review of recent peer-reviewed research and analysis of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) child protective services (CPS) and early childhood development data. National responses to neglect in 73 countries were described in the International Society for the Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect’s World Perspectives 2016 data and through illustrative case studies of recent CRC country reports for Australia, China, India and Mozambique.
Neglect is prevalent throughout the world, although its extent and form vary. Most countries recognize neglect as a form of maltreatment and have basic CPS policies and some system in place, but implementation of prevention and intervention services remains inadequate even in high-income countries. Economic and other barriers inhibit progress to address the neglect of children.
Progress has been made in establishing basic child protections and other safeguards for neglect in most countries, but significant barriers and inadequacies remain. Implementation of the CRC is uneven and there are large gaps in needed services. Much work remains to better assess and address this serious problem, in every country.
Maternal depression is linked with a range of child and adolescent outcomes. Prior research suggests adverse consequences for child and youth development, but less is known about the role of adverse ...parenting in the pathways from maternal depression to adolescent emotional and behavioral problems.
The present study leveraged a large, longitudinal survey of families across the U.S. to investigate whether harsh parenting mediated the links between maternal depression and adolescent delinquency and depression.
Data came from a national longitudinal survey of families with children born in large U.S. cities 1998-2000 in which mothers had at least partial custody of children (N = 2,719).
Structural equation modeling with latent variables estimated a measurement model using confirmatory factor analysis and a structural model testing direct and indirect pathways.
Maternal depression was directly associated with both physical and psychological aggression in parenting (β = 0.08, p < 0.001 and β = 0.12, p < 0.001, respectively), and psychological aggression related directly with adolescent delinquency (β = 0.24, p < 0.01). Furthermore, maternal depression was indirectly associated with adolescent delinquency via psychological aggression in parenting (β = 0.03, p < 0.05). Physical aggression in parenting did not mediate links between maternal depression and either adolescent outcome.
Findings provide insights into the parent-level drivers of adolescent emotional and behavioral outcomes. Screening for maternal depression and providing parenting support to vulnerable families offers promise for preventing adverse parenting and supporting healthy adolescent development.
