Reporting of emotional abuse in children
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Date
26/11/2010Author
Turnbull, Allyson Tracy
Metadata
Abstract
Background: There is a growing clinical and research interest into emotional abuse
and its detrimental impact on child welfare and development, yet increasing evidence
suggests that it remains both under-recognised and under-reported.
Objectives: The primary objective of this study was to describe the prevalence and
nature of emotional abuse experienced by a random sample of children referred to a
multi-agency Child Protection team, located within an NHS board, due to concerns
about maltreatment. The secondary objective of this study was to examine the
prevalence of children within the sample who were disabled.
Method: The study was a retrospective case note survey. Random samples of 108
case files were selected and reviewed using the Maltreatment Classification Record
Abstraction Instrument – MCRAI (Trickett et al., 2009). Fifteen items of parental
behaviour regarded as emotionally abusive were coded and organised into four
subtypes of emotional abuse. This information was applied to two psychological
maltreatment frameworks. Non parametric and descriptive statistics were used for
data analysis
Results: There was a significant difference found in the identification of emotional
abuse between clinician reporting, n=33 (30.6%), at the time of referral and the use
of the extraction tool with either psychological framework, n=78(72.2%). There was
only a small number of children with a disability identified within the random sample
who had experienced abuse and/or neglect n=12.
Conclusions: Greater awareness and understanding of emotional abuse would be
valuable in ensuring that children’s psychological needs are met and to avoid the
detrimental impact of this form of abuse. Clinicians would also benefit from a greater
understanding of the complexities of disabilities and how these can impact on child
protection investigations.