What Is Child Abuse

[Pauli]

What is Child Abuse and Neglect?
Factsheet
Author(s): Child Welfare Information Gateway
Year Published: 2006
Each State provides its own definitions of child abuse and neglect based on minimum standards set by Federal law.
How Is Child Abuse and Neglect Defined in Federal Law?
Federal legislation provides a foundation for States by identifying a minimum set of acts or behaviors that define child abuse and neglect. The Federal Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA), (42 U.S.C.A. §5106g), as amended by the Keeping Children and Families Safe Act of 2003, defines child abuse and neglect as, at minimum:

Any recent act or failure to act on the part of a parent or caretaker which results in death, serious physical or emotional harm, sexual abuse or exploitation; or
An act or failure to act which presents an imminent risk of serious harm.
What Are the Major Types of Child Abuse and Neglect?
Within the minimum standards set by CAPTA, each State is responsible for providing its own definitions of child abuse and neglect.1 Most States recognize four major types of maltreatment: neglect, physical abuse, sexual abuse, and emotional abuse. Although any of the forms of child maltreatment may be found separately, they often occur in combination.
The examples provided below are for general informational purposes only. Not all States' definitions will include all of the examples listed below, and individual States' definitions may cover additional situations not mentioned here.
Neglect is failure to provide for a child's basic needs. Neglect may be:

Physical (e.g., failure to provide necessary food or shelter, or lack of appropriate supervision)
Medical (e.g., failure to provide necessary medical or mental health treatment)2
Educational (e.g., failure to educate a child or attend to special education needs)
Emotional (e.g., inattention to a child's emotional needs, failure to provide psychological care, or permitting the child to use alcohol or other drugs) These situations do not always mean a child is neglected. Sometimes cultural values, the standards of care in the community, and poverty may be contributing factors, indicating the family is in need of information or assistance. When a family fails to use information and resources, and the child's health or safety is at risk, then child welfare intervention may be required.
Physical abuse is physical injury (ranging from minor bruises to severe fractures or death) as a result of punching, beating, kicking, biting, shaking, throwing, stabbing, choking, hitting (with a hand, stick, strap, or other object), burning, or otherwise harming a child. Such injury is considered abuse regardless of whether the caretaker intended to hurt the child.
Sexual abuse includes activities by a parent or caretaker such as fondling a child's genitals, penetration, incest, rape, sodomy, indecent exposure, and exploitation through prostitution or the production of pornographic materials.
Sexual abuse is defined by CAPTA as "the employment, use, persuasion, inducement, enticement, or coercion of any child to engage in, or assist any other person to engage in, any sexually explicit conduct or simulation of such conduct for the purpose of producing a visual depiction of such conduct; or the rape, and in cases of caretaker or inter-familial relationships, statutory rape, molestation, prostitution, or other form of sexual exploitation of children, or incest with children."
Emotional abuse is a pattern of behavior that impairs a child's emotional development or sense of self-worth. This may include constant criticism, threats, or rejection, as well as withholding love, support, or guidance. Emotional abuse is often difficult to prove and, therefore, CPS may not be able to intervene without evidence of harm to the child. Emotional abuse is almost always present when other forms are identified.



Resources
Child Abuse and Neglect
www.childwelfare.gov/can (http://www.childwelfare.gov/can/)
Resources and information from the Child Welfare Information Gateway website about child maltreatment, including definitions, signs and symptoms, statistics, types, risk and protective factors, impact, and child fatalities.
Defining Child Abuse and Neglect
www.childwelfare.gov/can/defining/ (http://www.childwelfare.gov/can/defining/)
Resources and information from the Child Welfare Information Gateway website.
Child Maltreatment 2004: Summary of Key Findings
www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/factsheets/canstats.cfm (http://www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/factsheets/canstats.cfm)
Summarizes national child abuse statistics regarding investigations of child abuse and neglect, victims of maltreatment, perpetrators, fatalities, and services.
Reporting Child Abuse and Neglect
www.childwelfare.gov/responding/reporting.cfm (http://www.childwelfare.gov/responding/reporting.cfm)
Resources and information from the Child Welfare Information Gateway website.
Laws and Policies
www.childwelfare.gov/systemwide/laws_policies/index.cfm (http://www.childwelfare.gov/systemwide/laws_policies/)
Resources and information about State and Federal laws on child abuse and neglect, child welfare, and adoption.
Recognizing Child Abuse and Neglect: Signs and Symptoms
www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/factsheets/signs.cfm (http://www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/factsheets/signs.cfm)
Lists general signs that may signal the presence of child abuse or neglect, as well as signs associated with specific types of abuse.
Preventing Child Abuse and Neglect
www.childwelfare.gov/preventing (http://www.childwelfare.gov/preventing)
Resources and information from the Child Welfare Information Gateway website.



http://www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/factsheets/whatiscan.cfm

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Psychological punishment can be more severely damaging than physical abuse. Children who are confined, held captive, interrogated and subjected to humiliation, degradation that strips the child of all dignity tend to develop Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

[Sumanadevii]

Emotional abuse, which is 8% of all substantiated cases of child abuse, is commonly defined as the systematic tearing down of another human being. It is considered a pattern of behavior that can seriously interfere with a child's positive development. Emotional abuse is probably the least understood of all child abuse, yet it is the most prevalent, and can be the cruelest and most destructive of all types of abuse.
http://www.preventchildabuse.com/emotion.htm

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Children who witness domestic violence have suffered child abuse. CPS will remove children from homes with documented domestic violence in the family.

[Sumanadevii]

Children who witness domestic violence have suffered child abuse. CPS will remove children from homes with documented domestic violence in the family.

It is considered Neglect...
Physical neglect -- accounts for the majority of cases of maltreatment. The definition includes the refusal of or extreme delay in seeking necessary health care, child abandonment, inadequate supervision, rejection of a child leading to expulsion from the home, and failing to adequately provide for the child's safety and physical and emotional needs. Physical neglect can severely impact a child's development by causing failure to thrive, malnutrition; serious illnesses; physical harm in the form of cuts, bruises and burns due to lack of supervision and a lifetime of low self-esteem.
http://www.preventchildabuse.com/neglect.htm

I didn't write the articles..just sharing...:22wink:

[windovervocalcords]

The fact that CPS will remove these children from the home for witnessing domestic violence indicates that the seriousness of the traumatic effect the children suffer.

CPS agencies are required to intervene in cases where child exposure to domestic violence meets the State or local legal definition of child abuse and neglect and in instances where children, in addition to adult victims, are physically or sexually abused. Presenting risk factors associated with potentially dangerous and lethal forms of domestic violence also will require intervention by CPS. Parental substance abuse and mental illness are two examples of risk factors that can increase the threat of harm to children who witness domestic violence.

There are some situations, however, where child protection efforts to secure the safety of children can and should occur without a formal determination of abuse or neglect.

http://www.enotalone.com/article/9997.html

One cannot assume that in all cases, children have been abused who witnessed domestic violence. It depends on the age of the child, how severe the violence witnessed and reports and observations of the children's behavior. CPS workers have a mandate to work closely with domestic violence agencies. Domestic violence agencies have a duty to report if children are present in the home when domestic violence occurs.

Some children demonstrate enormous resiliency and others exhibit evidence of long term and intractable damage from their experience of witnessing DV.

I was a CPS worker in the past BTW.

[windovervocalcords]

It completely depends on the circumstances in the family and the reactions of the children to the violence.

In my community, CPS removed two children aged 3 and 5 from the home of their parents who were alcoholics and mutually combative. It was not just a situation that mom was failing to protect her children by not leaving her husband. Mom was mentally ill and very violent also.

It is very sad to take children away from their parents even in circumstances like these.

Children are the forgotten victims of domestic violence. Clinicians report that exposure to violence in the family setting is more harmful than witnessing violence outside the family context.1 "Children who live in a battering relationship experience the most insidious form of child abuse, [. . .] [w]hether or not they are physically abused by either parent is less important than the psychological scars they bear from watching their fathers beat their mothers."

A. Short-Term Effects

The effects of witnessing domestic violence on young children are traumatic.

They learn to become part of a dishonest conspiracy of silence. They learn to lie to prevent inappropriate behavior, and they learn to suspend fulfillment of their needs rather than risk another confrontation. They do expend a lot of energy avoiding problems. They live in a world of make believe.

Basic needs of attachment for infants to their mother may be significantly disrupted. School age children exhibit poor school performance, erratic attendance, distractibility, and school phobia.

Socially, children who witness domestic violence tend to choose either passive or aggressive behavior to resolve interpersonal conflicts. They exhibit shyness, depression, anxiety, low self-esteem and feelings of shame, guilt, and confusion as a result of their experiences. Furthermore, the reports of attempted suicides are greater for children who witness domestic violence than those who have not.

B. Long-Term Effects

As the witnesses of domestic violence grow older, they tend to exhibit some of the same behavior that their parents have demonstrated.

The witnessing children are the most pathetic victims of conjugal crime because their childhood conditioning will color their entire lives. All other input will be processed through the mire of the first marriage they ever saw and their earliest role models of husband and wife, father and mother.

From one generation to the next their experiences illustrate a never-ending cycle of violence. Adult batterers are likely to have grown up in families in which battering occurred. A significant percentage of battered women have childhoods marked by witnessing violence themselves or being physically and sexually abused. At a young age women come to believe that victimization is inevitable and no one can help change this pattern.

By criminalizing the exposure to children of domestic violence, the abuser is put on notice that his/her actions are not only harming the direct victim, but also the children who witness. Furthermore, children will understand that the abuser's actions are wrong, which may prevent the generational cycle of violence.
http://www.mobar.org/journal/1998/sepoct/susi.htm