Multiple assessors of child welfare youths' mental‐health functioning: comparing perceptions of adolescents,caregivers and teachers

For youth involved with the child welfare system, accurate assessment of mental‐health functioning is a critical factor in case planning. To assess correspondence among multiple reporters of child welfare youths' mental‐health difficulties, this study, using data drawn from the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well‐being dataset, examined the caregiver, teacher and youth (aged 11–16 years) reports on the Child Behavior Checklist (n = 464). Perceptions about symptomatology on a variety of externalizing and internalizing behaviour problem scales were measured with a correlation analysis. Subsequently, logistic regression models were created, which explored how each reporter category matched a fourth reporter category: the child welfare investigation caseworkers' identification of youths' mental‐health needs. Results show that in several models, the odds of matching caseworkers' determination of youths' mental‐health needs significantly increased as youths' perceptions of psychopathology increased. A similar pattern was found for caregivers' perceptions in some of the models, across both internalizing and externalizing domains. Implications for child welfare practice and research with child welfare youth are discussed.     

The bumpy road to ‘becoming’: capturing the stories that teenage mothers told about their journey into motherhood

Understanding the experience of women who become mothers during their teenage years is central to ensuring that the support that is offered is appropriate to meet their needs. This paper reports on a small part of a larger ethnographic study that captured the lived experience of young mothers who were between the ages of 16 and 19 years that potentially typifies and illuminates the experiences of young women who become mothers in their teenage years. By collecting data from narrative interviews as well as participant and non‐participant observations over an extended period of time it was possible to identify how the young women experienced a range of difficulties as they made their transition into motherhood. Drawing on the findings, this paper argues that this transition for teenage mothers can be significantly different from the experience of older mothers, and it identifies the importance of appropriate support to mediate the challenges that they face. Understanding the young women's journey to ‘becoming’ is critical when planning services because if their experience of support is negative, it can lead to increased levels of maternal stress and reluctance to engage with support services.     

Living in the red zone: the experience of child‐to‐mother violence

Child‐to‐mother violence is an area of family violence that has received limited attention over the past 20 years but is a problem for many families. It is poorly understood in the community and this lack of understanding creates a basis for families and service providers to minimize the abused mothers' experience. This paper is drawn from a larger study that aimed to explore child‐to‐mother violence in a high‐risk geographical area and describes a qualitative theme developed from 185 participating women's narratives, ‘Living in the red zone’: the experience of child‐to‐mother violence. The red zone refers to danger and was an element throughout women's narratives. It is clear from the reflections of these women that child‐to‐mother violence is a significant and complex issue. Mothers were predominantly struggling in silence with their experiences of a child or children whose behaviour was threatening and/or abusive. Their experiences were most often minimized and/or devalued by family and community members, which may prevent affected women from seeking support. Mothers generally had limited concepts of the possibilities open to them to improve their situation, or limited access to appropriate and empathic individuals or services.     

Children's and young people's participation within child welfare and child protection services: a state‐of‐the‐art review

This state‐of‐the‐art literature review, based on a literature search of multiple scientific bibliographic databases, aims to shed light on what is known about barriers and factors facilitating child participation within the child protection and child welfare services from both children's and social workers' perspectives. The personal relationship between the child and the social worker is mentioned as one of the most important facilitators for participation, although multiple barriers in creating this relationship are demonstrated by both children and case managers and social workers. In studies, children say they should always participate while social workers and case managers identify many situations where, according to them, participation is inappropriate. Professionals' objections to participation mainly stem from the socio‐cultural image of children as vulnerable and in need of adult protection, and a lack of understanding of what participation actually entails. Interventions to strengthen participation should be directed at making social workers and case managers aware that children are knowledgeable social actors.     

Goal setting in recovery: families where a parent has a mental illness or a dual diagnosis

Goal setting is an important element within mental health recovery models; however, parenting and children are rarely recognized in such approaches. This study outlines a family recovery planning model where a parent has a mental health or dual substance and mental health problem. The differences between family types (parent with a mental illness or parent with dual diagnosis) and family members (parent and children) are illustrated in terms of goals across 11 domains. There were a total of 33 parents and 50 children from 10 mental illness and 10 dual diagnosis families. Education and specifically mental health knowledge are important goals across all families and appear especially important for children whose parent has a dual diagnosis. Specific goals and achievement levels for each type of family and parents and children are also outlined. Clear areas for action by clinicians and family members are indicated by this study.     

Participation of youth in decision‐making procedures during residential care: A narrative review

Participation in decision‐making procedures of young people in care is considered a key element that affects their current or future living circumstances and might improve the quality of decision‐making on and delivery of provided services. This narrative literature review, covering the period 2000–2016, focuses on the opportunities of young people to participate, the challenges and facilitators to participation, and the outcomes of care related to participation. Sixteen studies met our search criteria. Several studies show that young people seem to have limited possibilities to “meaningful” participation in decision‐making. Various challenges and facilitators in the participation process emerge with regard to the level of the young person, the professional, and the (sociocultural) context. None of the studies provides evidence for a connection between the “amount” of youth participation in decision‐making and/or treatment during the care process and the outcomes of residential care. Implications for research and practice are reflected upon.     

Putting the child at the centre of inter‐professional cooperation in out‐of‐home care

A large part of most children's childhood is about taking part in educational and leisure‐time activities together with other children across various contexts. However, children in out‐of‐home care do not always have easy access to these possibilities for participation. In general, parents coordinate their children's everyday lives, but in the case of children in out‐of‐home care, the responsibility of care is distributed between several professionals and institutions. Research often recommends that inter‐professional cooperation should put the child at the centre and be more child focused. But what does that mean? The paper investigates theoretical understandings of ‘child centredness’ in inter‐professional cooperation. It also includes an empirical example taken from a research project that followed four children in their everyday lives in two residential homes in Denmark. The research explored how professionals work together across contexts in order to support children to take part in school and leisure‐time activities. The overall reasoning leads to the point that for children in out‐of‐home care, the possibility of exercising personal agency in their everyday life constitutes a difficult but vital issue. How children in out‐of‐home care learn how to conduct their everyday lives, is closely related to the ways professionals cooperate across contexts. It points to the need for close inter‐professional cooperation in order to encourage and support children's initiatives and engagements in activities in communities with other children.     

More than therapy: The link between adverse childhood experiences,social support,and therapeutic services

Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) have a cumulative effect on physical, emotional, and social well‐being throughout the life course. ACEs also impact parenting practices, which may contribute to intergenerational cycles of trauma. Access to child mental health services and caregiver social support are two protective factors that may reduce the burden of ACEs. To advance understanding of the relationships between caregiver social support and child mental health services among caregivers with ACEs, we interviewed 13 caregivers of young children receiving outpatient mental health services. Thematic analysis revealed the integral role of therapeutic providers in the social support circles of caregivers with high ACE scores. Caregivers frequently named therapeutic providers as the first point of contact in a problem situation. Implications for social work research, clinical practice, and advocacy are discussed.     

‘It's about changing services and building relationships’: evaluating the development of Children in Care Councils

The introduction of Children in Care Councils under the Care Matters reforms in England set a challenge for local authorities to find effective ways by which children in care could contribute their views to the planning and provision of services. This paper discusses a review of progress across London which combined a survey of boroughs with focus group discussions with young people, local authority staff and elected members. The research found that considerable progress had been made in that virtually all boroughs had some mechanism for representing children in care, and that staff and young people were proud of their achievements. However, major challenges remain – to embed a culture of participation in services, to ensure continuity, to reach all children including the many placed ‘out of borough’ and to defend what has been achieved in the face of severe cuts in public spending. The paper highlights a tension between empowering young people and meeting targets as corporate parents. The results support other research pointing to the need for a better understanding of the relationship between participation in governance and participation grounded in ordinary life.     

Need,well‐being and outcomes: the development of policy‐thinking for children's services 1989–2004

This paper describes how government policy thinking about the well‐being of children and young people developed between the Children Act 1989 and the Children Act 2004. These two Acts are milestone statements about how services to children in England and Wales should be delivered. It is an account informed by the author's own experience as a government adviser on children's social care over much of this period and supporting documentation. It traces the strands of government policy thinking about how to deliver services for children from children in need to the articulation of the five Every Child Matters outcomes. It argues that attempts to achieve coordinated service planning for children and young people played a significant role in the formulation of shared objectives and the articulation of child outcomes. However, it argues that looking at real outcomes exposes how children in the UK do relatively badly compared with other rich nations. It questions whether we can realistically expect our services to deliver significantly improved outcomes given the impact of enduring inequality in our society. This paper is dedicated to the memory of David Lambert CBE, former Assistant Chief Inspector of the Social Services Inspectorate in London, who died suddenly on 7 October 2010. He lent me articles to assist me in writing this paper.     

Vulnerable children's rights to participation,protection, and provision: The process of defining the problem in Swedish child and family welfare

This study addresses the relationship between children's participation and the protection and provision offered to them by social services in Sweden. It applies a theoretical framework for analysing child welfare that is anchored in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. How child participation may affect child protection and provision is examined empirically using case documentation from 2 municipalities. The main finding is that when children are not given voice or opportunity to influence the framing of what “the problem” is, the design of protection and care tends to be poorly matched to the actual problems documented in the child investigation and vice versa; when children can influence framing, this is associated with well‐matched protection and care. This suggests that traditional child welfare ethos, to the effect that protection should be of such overriding concern that children even should be protected from participation, is misguided. The study further illustrates the intrinsic problems with the family orientation of Swedish social services and its reliance on partnership with parents, which makes it difficult to live up to the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Incorporating child participation into existing service models can transform Swedish social services to an augmented child‐focused system that by ensuring participation also promotes protection and provision.     

Finding the right connections: Peer support within a community‐based mental health service

Gray M., Davies K., Butcher L. Finding the right connections: Peer support within a community‐based mental health service This article reports on a qualitative study that examined the organisational enablers and barriers to implementing peer support work in an Australian, rural, community‐based mental health service. Interviews with 19 peer and non‐peer staff were conducted to identify attitudes towards peer support and whether there were organisational values, practices and strategies that might support the implementation of peer support. The findings revealed that peer support workers were valued for their ability to build trusting connections with clients and to accept client choice in a non‐judgemental way. However, peer support workers tended to ‘fill service gaps’ within intensive, administrative case‐management environments. These findings highlight the importance of an organisational‐wide approach to integrating peer support, where the responsibilities for adopting new ways of working fall to all staff, not just the peer support workers themselves. Key Practitioner Message: ? Practitioners placed high value on the peer support workers on their teams due to their unique personalised engagement with clients; ? The roles of peer support workers were poorly understood by team members; ? Organisational integration of peer support principles could improve the way all staff engage with clients to reflect a recovery orientation.     

Mothers' and Fathers' Emotion Socialization and Children's Emotion Regulation: A Within‐Family Model

In the current study, we examined whether mothers' and fathers' reactions to young children's positive and negative emotions were associated with children's negativity and emotion regulation. We utilized a within‐family design with 70 families (mother, father, and two siblings between the ages of 2 and 5 years). Mothers and fathers completed questionnaires about their emotion socialization as well as children's negativity and emotion regulation. Results indicated that mothers' and fathers' unsupportive reactions to children's positive emotions were associated with children's negativity. Fathers' unsupportive reactions to children's emotional displays were differentially associated with older and younger siblings' emotion regulation. Fathers' unsupportive responses to children's positive and negative emotions also contributed jointly to children's emotion regulation. The results suggest that exploring the within‐family correlates of children's emotion regulation and negativity is useful for understanding children's emotional development.     

Worries and problems of young carers: issues for mental health

This paper reports on a research study which explored the worries and problems of young carers in Edinburgh. Sixty‐one young carers took part in the study, conducted between April and June 2002. Findings indicate that young carers identify significant worries and problems in relation to their well‐being, and that these come over and above any ‘normal’ adolescent difficulties. It is suggested that these findings may have important implications for young carers’ mental health, now and in the future, and contain important lessons for child and family social work in general.     

Sharing personal information in the child protection context: Impediments in the Australian legal framework

Professionals, including social workers, in the child protection context are frequently required to make decisions on whether to share sensitive personal information about children, their families, and others with colleagues and across institutional and jurisdictional boundaries. Sharing information across agencies and organisations is essential to allow joined‐up service provision and to effectively protect and support children and their families. A legal framework that supports this decision making is a necessary, although not sufficient, condition for effective information sharing. This article examines the complex legal framework that governs information sharing across the Australian states and territories. It identifies a number of structural and regulatory elements that unnecessarily limit information sharing or have a tendency to create a culture that is risk averse, rather than proactive, in sharing information. The article suggests structural and regulatory reforms that would improve the legal framework for sharing information, while at the same time giving due recognition to the human rights that come into tension in this policy context: the right to privacy and the rights of the child.     

How I wonder what you are: Children's songs as a source of mental and internal state information

This study investigated (1) whether children's songs could be potential sources of internal state information and (2) cross-cultural/linguistic differences in the availability of such information. We coded for expressions of mental states and other internal states in 255 English songs, likely accessed by children in the United States, and 255 Japanese songs, likely accessed by Japanese children. The majority of the songs in both samples contained at least one internal state expression, with songs containing four to five tokens and two types of internal state expressions on average. Japanese songs had more types of internal state expressions than English songs when comparing the two samples in proportion scores that controlled for the length of songs. However, differences between English and Japanese songs were negligible in the absolute frequency of tokens and types of internal state expressions, with the exception that Japanese songs were richer in ambiguous internal state expressions.     

Inter‐agency joint protocols for safeguarding children in social care and adult mental‐health agencies: a cross‐sectional survey of practitioner experiences

Parental mental illness, substance misuse and domestic violence are common risk factors for the maltreatment and neglect of children. Safeguarding children is everyone's responsibility, including professionals working primarily with adults. In the UK, Local Safeguarding Children Boards (LSCBs) were established to ensure that all agencies work together to safeguard children. Many LSCBs developed multi‐agency joint protocols to enhance collaboration, but there is limited evidence of their effectiveness. This paper reports findings from a cross‐sectional survey of practitioner self‐reported experiences of joint protocols, which was conducted in one inner London borough, to evaluate their impact on professional practice. A self‐complete questionnaire administered to all professionals in adult mental‐health and children's social care services in the borough yielded a response from 119 practitioners. The survey found that the protocols had been widely disseminated and provided clear guidance to practitioners. Practitioners perceived that they had increased awareness of the risk factors for safeguarding children and some had used the protocols to help them gain access to services for their clients. Practitioners also perceived that they had improved inter‐agency working between children's social care and adult mental‐health services. However, respondents indicated that positive interpersonal contact with practitioners from other agencies was equally important in promoting joint working and inter‐agency collaboration.     

“Respect for each gender”: Gender,equity and backlash in Australia's male health policy

Australia is one of the few countries which has specific health policies for boys/men and girls/women as distinct groups. In this article I present an analysis of the discourses of gender, equity and disadvantage drawn upon in Australia's men's health policy. Through comparison with the women's health policy, I show that a dual focus on the essential differences between men and women and the ways in which the health system has failed men contribute to an adversarial gender politics, positioning men and women as rivals with competing needs. Reflecting broader debates concerning the negative impact of societal change on boys/men, I argue that, in its current form, Australia's health policy both taps into and, crucially, legitimises backlash politics, enabling it to ‘pass’ as sound public policy.     

A critical review of mental health and mental health‐related policies in China: More actions required

In China, there are over 170 million people suffering from mental illness. However, there is a lack of a critical review of the policies governing the provision of mental health services. Drawing on the framework of mental health policy developed by the WHO, this article critically examines mental health policies regarding legislation, financing, model of care and delivery, as well as manpower and the training of mental health professionals in China. This analysis raises a number of policy‐related questions concerning the lack of community‐based psychiatric services, inadequate coverage of mental health services in the rural areas, poor standard of education and an insufficient number of trained mental health professionals, and insufficient protection of the human rights of people with mental illness. The article ends by urging the various levels of governments to make a firm commitment to improve mental health care for people with mental illness in China.