Recognizing
the Signs of Child Abuse
Injured child whose parents do not seek
immediate medical care.
Attempts to conceal child's injuries or
vagueness about how injuries occurred.
Child who always shows up at your house
at meal time and asks for food or seems badly nourished.
Unsupervised child out on the street at
inappropriate times.
Unusual behavior like aggressive,
negative, or extremely passive and withdrawn; excessive fatigue. |
by Susan English and
Thomas Wohlmut
The number of reported cases of child abuse has risen since 1976 from around
400,000 to almost 3 million. Statistics from 1995 indicate that about 52 percent of
the victims suffered neglect, 25 percent suffered physical
abuse, 13 percent sexual abuse, 5 percent emotional maltreatment, 3 percent medical
neglect, and 14 percent other forms of maltreatment. Some children suffered more
than one type of abuse.
The U.S. Advisory Board on Child Abuse and
Neglect reported in 1990, "Child maltreatment is especially likely to occur when
families under stress lack support from their neighbors. Child maltreatment occurs
more frequently among socially isolated families."
Very few studies have compared biological
parent vs. stepparent child abuse. One 1989 study compared families in which a
daughter had been sexually abused by a biological father or stepfather. The study
confirmed that biological father abuser families showed much higher levels of drug and/or
alcohol abuse, marital problems, and low income than did stepfather abuser families.
Another study by Margo Wilson and Martin Daly
of McMaster University analyzed murder records from the U.S. and Canada and determined
that children under two years were at least 60 times more likely to be killed by a
stepparent than by a biological parent. They emphasize that no one should infer from
their results that stepparents are fated to abuse their children. In fact, most
stepparents treat their children benignly, they state.
None of the above studies or statistics can
explain the cause of child abuse. But what about prevention? Several studies
indicate that education for mothers (particularly young mothers) about expectations for
their newborn is helpful. Learning parenting skills and coping strategies can help parents
of any age avoid adopting abusive patterns of parenting. Public awareness campaigns
can help parents recognize alternatives to abusive behavior and words. School
curriculum can help empower children to say no
to inappropriate touches and other abusive behavior. In addition, laws demanding
more stringent requirements for day-care centers will encourage greater supervision of
day-care providers.
Much more remains to be discovered about the
prevention of abuse. The idea of screening populations to define high-risk groups
does not appear to have any promise in reducing abuse. Some interventions, however,
do show signs of being helpful, workable, and effective in minimizing the risk of child
abuse. These fall into three broad strategies:
-- Establish relationships with children that enhance the child’s self-esteem,
decrease isolation, and facilitate disclosure of abuse.
-- Develop parenting and coping skills.
-- Generate public efforts to develop awareness of alternatives to and safeguards against
abusive behaviors.
No single factor triggers child abuse and
neglect. Instead, many different factors pave the way for maltreatment -- from
marital conflict to unemployment to drug and alcohol abuse, to name a few. Theories
of child abuse and neglect that consider interactions of factors are just now being
developed.
What's important for stepfamilies is to
recognize the special stresses in their relationships that may lead to child abuse
-- and then take healthy action to cope with those stresses.
Source: U.S. Department
of Health and Human Services, Child Maltreatment 1995; Child Abuse and Neglect,
13:1, 121-130, 1989; and National Academy Op-Ed Service, 11/14/93
©2000 Stepfamily Network,
Inc.
UPDATE:
The well-presented page "Child abuse in stepfamilies: is it
worse?" by
Susan English and Thomas Wohlmut refers to a finding by Daly and
Wilson
that children under two years were much more likely to be killed if
they
lived with a stepparent than with both biological parents.
Just wanted to
point out, in case they update the page, that a more recent
and very
comprehensive study in Sweden, including every case of child
homicide that
occurred in Sweden between 1975 and 1997 failed to find any such
association. Hans Temrin, Susanne Buchmayer and Magnus Enquist
at
Stockholm University found that "children in Sweden living in
families with
a step-parent were not at an increased risk compared with children
living
together with two parents to whom they were genetically
related." Reference: Proceedings of the Royal Society
Series B (Biological
Sciences) volume 267, pages 945-945 (2000).
Sincerely, Steve George
______________________________________________________
Prof. Stephen George
Phone: 413-542-2477
Biology Dept. and Neuroscience Program
FAX: 413-542-7955
Amherst College
sageorge@amherst.edu
Amherst, MA 01002-5000
http://www.amherst.edu/~sageorge
_______________________________________________________
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