This qualitative study examines collective responsibility for the well-being of maltreated children who remain at home. Based on accounts of mothers, teachers and child welfare workers, and policy officials, the study uses institutional ethnography to examine how schools and child welfare authorities work together and with families. Contributing to the socio-legal literature, it explores understandings of responsibility in formal law and in practice. The policy response to these children’s needs raises significant theoretical and political issues because they are on the borderlands of public and private responsibility. Child welfare involvement signals public intervention is required to ensure protection and well-being. Strong, proactive, and coordinated support by public authorities should follow. However, data suggest three pervasive theoretical or political accounts legitimize very limited support. (1) The notion of home and school as separate spheres. Participants understand and in theory support the highly prescriptive regulation governing reporting and contact between schools and CAS. But in practice participants pointed to limits on responsibility for knowledge or communication across the boundaries. Participants acknowledged limited knowledge or communication despite a regulatory regime that promotes and assumes it. (2) Comprehensive family responsibility. Deeply-rooted notions of family responsibility and autonomy render public support for struggling families and children relatively discretionary. A policy and practice scan shows child welfare provides less educational support to children living in the community relative to those in foster care, and minimal individual or systemic accountability for services to these children. (3) Persistent heroic narratives of the teacher who ‘makes a difference’ through exceptional commitment to struggling students. To relegate caring work to realm of personal commitment privatizes responsibility for an important aspect of effective teaching. Though cited as exemplary, the exercise of these responsibilities is not supported, not demanded, and not planned for, which is problematic for interagency co-operation and teacher burnout. These political and institutional narratives limit the system’s response to the needs of these vulnerable children to discretion and chance. Meeting their needs requires not only a focus on coordination across bureaucratic boundaries, but also strengthening the visibility of, and accountability for, issues of well-being within education and child welfare.

Child maltreatment is a significant public health problem that increases when children live in homes in which intimate partner violence (IPV) is present. Child maltreatment and IPV often co-occur, and the sequelae of IPV frequently appear in both the victimized mother and her children. Home visitation programs, such as SafeCare®, are used as intervention strategies to reduce the risk of child maltreatment, but rarely are these programs adapted for Latino populations. The importance of cultural sensitivity in parenting programs has been highlighted as a means of producing successful outcomes when working with Latino families. The present single-case research design study evaluated the efficacy of SafeCare's Parent-Infant Interaction (PII) module when delivered in Spanish to a Latino mother with prior experiences of IPV. Observational data were used to document changes in parenting behaviors, while self-report measures assessed exposure to IPV and changes in mental health, parenting stress, and the risk of child maltreatment. Qualitative data provided suggestions for culturally adapting PII for Latino families. Data from this study suggest that PII improves parent-infant interactions when delivered in Spanish and reduces the risk of child maltreatment. Additionally, self-report measures indicate that IPV, parent mental health distress, and the risk of child maltreatment co-occur. This study also shares with the field the importance of providing culturally adapted programs when working with Latino families.

Employees of the criminal correctional system have a duty to notify social services if they suspect that children are exposed to maltreatment, according to Chapter 14, § 1 SoL. Despite the obligation to report, studies show that this is not done at all times. The purpose of this paper is to describe and analyze how the criminal correctional system in Kalmar looks at notification if they suspect that children are exposed to maltreatment. To examine this, we used qualitative research method based on semi-structuring interviews; these were carried out with six employees, working in the criminal correctional system. The answers that emerged during the interviews have been analyzed using Yeheskel Hasenfeld theory of human services organizations, and trough previous research. The results of this study show that the level of knowledge has improved recently and it is not always certain that issues are reported.

The aim of this study is to understand and describe school staff´s view on the legal obligation to report child maltreatment. With this approach I will get a better understanding how child maltreatment can be caught up in the Swedish community. Previous research shows that school is one of the authorities who report most children to social services. Previous research indicates that cooperation between school and social services reduces the time of the investigations, and gives a better understanding of what is to be reported. The result shows that a functional cooperation between school staff´s as well as between school and social services is important for children to be caught up in the community. The result also shows that the school tends to do investigations themselves. This is not what the law says. It can result that a report to social services will late or absent. This study is written by a social constructivism approach and with Bronfenbrenners theory, the ecology of human development.

<p>Many children in Sweden are exposed to maltreatment. Among the purposes of the Child health care (CHC) are to decrease mortality, infirmity and handicaps among mothers and their children, and to decrease hurtful strains for parents and their children. CHC-nurses get critizism for not reporting child maltreatment in high enough numbers to the Social service. The aim of this study was to chart how CHC-nurses finds their work with families suffering from maltreatment. Ten CHC-nurses were interviewed with semistructured interviews. The study has a qualitative approach and the interviews were analysed with the help of content analysis. In the result it appears that CHC-nurses experiences working with families suffering from maltreatment is very emotional. The support from collegues, psychlogists and co-operation with Mother Health Care, pre-school and Social Service is valuable. It’s hard to judge which who are exposed to maltreatment because the definition is unclear. There’s a wish to be able to help more families without needing to report to the Social service. The prevented work by the CHC agains maltreatment should get a more prominent clear position in CHC’s standard program for the entire family.</p>

<p>Several studies have shown that children who grow up under adverse care giving conditions are prone to develop a broad spectrum of different problems, ranging from mild depression to severe psychosomatic pathology later in life. A carefully treated child develops a different attachment strategy and biochemical response than a maltreated child. Early adverse events seem to program the stress response to become either over or under reactive which in turn have the potential to alter brain development. Major consequences include reduced plasticity and abnormal frontal lobe activity. This review further investigates the emotional and cognitive development in children exposed to early life abuse or neglect, trying to get a comprehensive picture of different symptoms that might contribute to later psychopathology.</p>

I show three new ways to use Google search query data. First, I use Google search data to measure racism in the United States and its effect on Obama in the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections. Second, I use Google search data to predict turnout in different parts of the United States prior to an election. Third, I use Google search data to measure child maltreatment and how maltreatment is affected by economic downturns. / Economics

Despite high rates of alcohol and marijuana use and dating violence among individuals between the ages of 15 and 24, limited research has examined a link between substance use and dating violence within adolescent samples. Moreover, although both problem drinking and dating violence perpetration have been linked to a history of childhood maltreatment (CM), few studies have examined the potential mechanisms of a relationship between these variables. The current study tested the predictive role of CM in adolescent alcohol and cannabis use and dating violence perpetration in a sample of youth with CM histories; in particular, we were interested in predicting the temporal co-occurrence of these behaviours. It was hypothesized that trauma symptomatology would play a mediating role in this relationship. Results demonstrated that only witnessing emotional domestic violence predicted the co-occurrence of substance use and dating violence; in general, trauma symptomatology was not found to be a significant mediator.

Several studies have shown that children who grow up under adverse care giving conditions are prone to develop a broad spectrum of different problems, ranging from mild depression to severe psychosomatic pathology later in life. A carefully treated child develops a different attachment strategy and biochemical response than a maltreated child. Early adverse events seem to program the stress response to become either over or under reactive which in turn have the potential to alter brain development. Major consequences include reduced plasticity and abnormal frontal lobe activity. This review further investigates the emotional and cognitive development in children exposed to early life abuse or neglect, trying to get a comprehensive picture of different symptoms that might contribute to later psychopathology.

Abstract Background: The aging population is a rapidly growing demographic. Isolation and limited autonomy render many of the elderly vulnerable to abuse, neglect and exploitation. As the population grows, so does the need for Adult Protective Services (APS). This study was conducted to examine current knowledge of Georgia older adult protection laws and to identify training opportunities to better prepare the APS workforce in cases detection and intervention. Methods: A primary survey was developed in partnership with the Georgia Division of Aging Services’ leadership to identify key training priority issues APS caseworkers and investigators. A 47-item, electronic questionnaire was delivered (using Psychdata) to all APS employees via work- issued email accounts. Descriptive analyses, t-tests, and chi-square analyses were used to determine APS employees’ baseline knowledge of Georgia’s elder abuse policies, laws, and practices as well as examine associations of age, ethnicity, and formal education level with knowledge. A p-value of <0 >.05 and 95% confidence intervals were used to determine statistical significance of the analyses performed. Results: In total, 92 out of 175 APS staff responded to the survey (53% response rate). The majority of respondents were Caucasian (56%) women (92%). For over half the survey items, a paired sample t-tests revealed significant differences between what APS staff reported as known and what APS staff members indicated they needed to know more about in terms of elder abuse and current policies. Chi-square tests revealed that non-Caucasians significantly preferred video conferencing as a training format (44% compared to 18%), [χ2 (1) = 7.102, p < .008] whereas Caucasians preferred asynchronous online learning formats (55% compared to 28%) [χ2 (1) =5.951, p < .015]. Conclusions: Results from this study provides the Georgia Division of Aging with insights into specific content areas that can be emphasized in future trainings. Soliciting input from intended trainees allows public health educators to tailor and improve training sessions. Trainee input may result in optimization of attendance, knowledge acquisition, and intervention practices regarding APS service delivery. This in turn can enhance APS staff efficiency and response to cases of violence against older adults.