Brief Treatment and Crisis Intervention Advance Access originally published online on September 14, 2007
Brief Treatment and Crisis Intervention 2007 7(4):364-382; doi:10.1093/brief-treatment/mhm013
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The Relationship Between Domestic Violence and Child Neglect
From the Kent School of Social Work, University of Louisville (Antle, Barbee, Sullivan, Yankeelov, Johnson) and Department of Communication, University of Louisville (Cunningham)
Contact author: Becky F. Antle, Kent School of Social Work, University of Louisville, Louisville, KY 40292. E-mail: becky.antle{at}louisville.edu.
This study examined the comorbidity of child neglect and domestic violence (DV) in a sample of public child welfare cases. All cases investigated for child neglect in 1999 (N = 2,350 families) from a single county in Kentucky were included in the analysis. Findings indicate that DV was comorbid in approximately 29% of the cases and, although cases were more likely to be opened when child neglect was substantiated, they were less likely to be opened when DV was also present. A secondary random subsample of 100 cases were reviewed to examine the impact of this comorbidity on the child welfare workers' assessment of risk and problems in children's functioning, the relationship between DV and risk factors contained on the risk assessment, and the workers' response to DV through legal actions and incorporation of DV into the case plan. The results showed that child welfare workers rate families at significantly greater risk, particularly when there was previously unreported DV, and identified more problems in children's interpersonal functioning when DV was present. DV was significantly correlated with more severe neglect and a limited social support network for the family. Although workers took a number of legal actions in response to DV, DV was addressed in only 35% of child welfare case plans.
KEY WORDS: child abuse, child neglect, domestic violence, comorbidity