Learning about child protection

Where do social workers acquire the knowledge they use in child protection work? What opportunities exist for them to access and use research? Should they bother? This paper addresses these questions using information provided by twelve local authority social workers involved in child protection work and findings from relevant research.

In a learning and work climate which appears not to encourage interest in research findings or knowledge from books generally, the paper considers both how knowledge from research might best be brought to the attention of busy workers and what are the necessary conditions for workers to develop and use knowledge in child care and protection practice.     

Defining and strengthening child well-being in child protection

Although the goals of safety and permanency for children continue as critically important mandates in child protection, the field has witnessed an increased focus on child well-being in recent years. Whereas safety and permanency have been well operationalized, child well-being appears to be a much more complex and daunting concept to define and measure. Current federal guidelines require child protective agencies to improve outcomes in the area of child well-being, and although federal regulations offer some direction on interpreting this concept, the definition and operationalization remain vague. As leaders in the field have attempted to provide language by which to talk about and measure child well-being, a number of key frameworks have emerged. In this paper, we present a conceptual map that provides a visual overlay of these existing frameworks that can help guide child protection policy-makers, administrators, and practitioners toward a fuller understanding of the complexities of child well-being. While this conversation on child well-being is not new, this paper aims to add to the national discussion and deepen the understanding and conceptualization of child wellbeing within the context of child protection.     

Reframing child protection: A response to a constant crisis of confidence in child protection

Child protection systems appear to be in a continual crisis of confidence. They get criticised for not doing enough to protect some children, whilst at the same time being criticised for being too intrusive or not managing demand. This constant balancing act drives almost continual reforms, none of which appear to reduce further crises of confidence. The central issue facing tertiary child protection systems stems from their function as makers of sometimes highly uncertain risk screening decisions. Uncertainty leads to errors; false positives and false negatives. Two recurring issues challenging child protection agencies are concerns about these errors. Fears about doing too much are concerns about false positives and fears of doing too little are concerns about false negatives. The need to address both issues within the context of uncertain high stakes decision making, in a highly risk intolerant environment leads to poorly formed sentinel event driven policy that in turn leads to organisational fragility. A decision outcome-based performance model based on Signal Detection Theory provides indicators that explicitly outline the link between these two strategic issues facing child protection systems. This has improved dialogue, understanding and support from sponsors. It has led an informed focus on improving decision making and stabilisation of decision thresholds. It demonstrates that Child protection systems are in fact very responsive and do perform well in their decision making (risk screening) function. Social work decision makers provide value in their decision making in spite of highly uncertain decisions to make. Child protection systems do not need reform, they need to be “reframed” to better understand true performance and so avoid poorly informed reactive policy responses to the genuine challenges that they face.     

Paediatric intervention in child protection

Since BASPCAN was founded 12 years ago an enormous amount has been achieved in both understanding and responding to the problems of child maltreatment. Paediatricians have played their part along with others, although the traditional view of medicine was that this was a social problem outside medical responsibility. Attitudes are changing and there is an increasing appreciation of the importance of maltreatment in many child health problems. It is also now accepted that doctors can only be effective if they work together in teams with other professionals. The consequences of child maltreatment present to paediatricians in many ways and symptoms and signs linked to abuse are common in clinical practice. Today the role of the paediatrician is much clearer and there is more guidance and information available about the diagnosis of sexual abuse. 1991 was the beginning of a new era in child protection where it will be seen whether the new insights acquired over the past decade can be applied for the welfare of children and families.     

Performance measurement in child protection

Abstract

The increasing use of performance measurement by government means that child protection services are under pressure to demonstrate effectiveness in protecting children from harm and efficiency in the use of public funds to help children and families. From a policy perspective, the way performance measurement is conceptualised and implemented can have major consequences for service delivery. This paper examines key issues raised in the literature about performance measurement, the context for its introduction in child protection, how the concepts of effectiveness and efficiency are dealt with, how client outcomes are defined, and assumptions about ‘good performance’. An overview of performance measurement in child protection in Australia is provided. The paper argues that a critical approach to performance measurement in child protection can contribute to improved service delivery to clients.     

African-American families and child protection

Two hundred and seventy African-American and Caucasian families referred to child protection for alleged maltreatment were compared to assess the degree to which they were differentially referred to and processed by child protection. Results indicated that, although African-Americans were referred to child protection by different sources than Caucasian families, reporter bias was unlikely to account for the differences. Those African-American families referred to child protection were more likely to come from female headed households and presumed to be poorer as a result. However, once reported, they were neither substantiated at a higher rate nor kept open for services at a higher rate compared to Caucasian families. Finally, there was very little evidence of differential caseworker attention to African-Americans compared with Caucasian families. The study concluded that differential referral source and/or differential worker attention were inadequate explanations for the over-representation of African-Americans in the child protection system.     

Family participation in child protection

The paper summarizes a Department of Health funded research study of the extent to which parents and children were involved in the child protection work of seven English social services departments. The child protection process and the social work practice with a cohort of 220 consecutive cases is described for the period before the initial conference and the 6 months following it. The authors draw on interview data from parents, young people and social workers and on social work records to assess whether the process and practice were participatory and the extent to which family members were actually involved in the decisions and the work. They concluded that there was benefit for parents and children in attempts to involve them, even thought only 3% of 378 family members were rated as partners in the protection process and a further 13% were rated as participating to a considerable extent. There was a statistically significant association between the participation of family members and the interim outcomes for the parents and children being rated by the researchers as good or moderately good.     

Making use of child protection statistics

SUMMARY. This paper examines the first set of national statistics collected regarding children on child protection registers. It aims to demonstrate how these statistics can be used to develop policy and practice in the child protection field, provided they are interpreted with care and utilised constructively     

Using child abuse inquiries in child protection education and training

In this article the two authors describe and analyse their experiences of using child abuse inquiries in child protection education with pre-qualifying social work students, over a period of 10 years. The article addresses a range of issues, including the effects of changes in child protection policy and practice; changes in social work education; the cumulative effects of the number of inquiry reports over the past 25 years; use of particular inquiry reports to discuss issues of oppression; the importance of sensitivity to the processes of such teaching and the emotional impact on social work students. The authors, one woman and one man, are both white and in their middle years. Prior to teaching social work, both were in child care and child protection practice for many years. One author's experience of sexist oppression informs particular aspects of the content of this teaching (see article) and both authors' experiences of endeavouring to be aware of, and sensitive to, the needs of social work students as individuals and as groups, has led them to take a particular approach when using child abuse inquiry reports in educating social workers in the complex and contested field of child protection practice.     

Understanding communication in child protection networks

Reviews of fatal child abuse cases regularly identify communication problems between the professionals. Understanding their origins requires an analysis of the psychology of communication as well as its technology, since it is a complex process in which interpersonal factors impact on the meaning that each person attributes to the messages given and received. The contexts within which the communications occur also colour how the messages are comprehended. Examples in practice from the Victoria Climbié Inquiry Report (Lord Laming, 2003 ) will be cited. Effective communication between professionals requires a mindset that can be developed through training. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

From protection to concern: child protection careers without apologies

This article provides evidence from a study of the careers of children in an English local authority from the point of the child protection investigation with a follow up of one year. The study demonstrates the way that for the vast majority welfare needs are ignored in the process of investigation and identifies the need to refocus investigations. The authors suggests criteria that can be used to provide a clearer focus on whether to investigate a referral.     

Issues in European child protection research

This paper considers the issues which emerged from studies relating to child protection in Europe and looks at the value and utility of cross-national comparisons in this field of social welfare. In one study, social workers in eight systems of child welfare took part in a study of practice based on a case vignette. In another, parents in three countries described their experience of child welfare interventions. The paper looks at elements of the structuring and functioning of child welfare and child protection, based on a triangulation of the experience of users and the experience of practitioners. Drawing examples from the research, the author considers how a knowledge of structures, culture and ideology can throw light on the functioning of child welfare services.