Emotional abuse of children: issues for intervention

Abstract

This article provides an overview of research into the emotional abuse of children, where it is the main or sole form of abuse. The aim of the project was to make a contribution to intervention in cases of psychological maltreatment. In order to do so, issues of de®nition, prevalence, location, manifestation and current intervention were explored. Both quantitative and qualitative data were required in order to address dierent aspects of the issues to be explored. Additionally, professional`provider' perspectives as well as`consumer' ones were sought. Information was therefore obtained from three sources: semi-structured interviews with 112 child protection professionals, a population survey of 504 students and in-depth interviews with 12 adult survivors of childhood emotional abuse. Outcomes included a suggested operational de®nition and an indication of prevalence. Emotional abuse appeared to be found in a broad range of families although it was more prominent in those exposed to multiple stressors. Abusive behaviours were identi®ed and categorized. Signs in the children were varied but included attempted suicide or self-harm, eating disorders and school problems. A notable contribution of the study was the identi®cation of the importance of lifelines for emotionally abused children which provided them with unconditional, positive regard.

Psychological Maltreatment

“…Although it is recognized that psychological maltreatment occurs in a wide range of families, it is more often associated with multiple family stresses 9 and, in particular, with factors such as family conflict, adult mental health problems, and parental substance abuse 10 that may be co-occurring. 11 For example, some parental mental health problems are associated with unpredictable and frightening behaviors, and others (particularly depression) are linked with parental withdrawal and neglect.…”

The Psychological Maltreatment of Children—Technical Report

“…In 1996, 15% of all registrations of maltreatment in England were for psychological maltreatment. 9 Parental attributes in cases reported for psychological maltreatment include poor parenting skills, substance abuse, depression, suicide attempts or other psychological problems, low self-esteem, poor social skills, authoritative parenting style, lack of empathy, social stress, domestic violence, and family dysfunction. 10 A number of studies have demonstrated that maternal affective disorder and/or substance abuse highly correlate to parent-child interactions that are verbally aggressive.…”

Correlates of Substantiated Emotional Maltreatment in the Second Canadian Incidence Study

“…Analyses of situations involving youth protection investigations show several parental vulnerability indicators, such as high proportions of addiction, mental health or psychiatric problems, criminal behaviour, cognitive deficiency, and problems of physical health and social isolation among aggressors treated for PMT (Chamberland et al 2005;Doyle 1997; Glaser and Prior 1997;Khamis 2000;Moore and Pepler 2006;Sheehan 2006). Studies of families in which children experience PMT have also shown that parents are not giving enough support to their children (Khamis 2000), that they have a propensity to feel hurt easily, and to disapprove of the child's expression of such negative emotions as anger or sadness (Walling et al 2007).…”

“…Some studies have found that victims of PMT tend to be older children (Chamberland et al 2005;Glaser and Prior 1997), while Sheehan (2006) has found that victims of PMT are more likely to be younger children. Doyle (1997), however, did not observe any particular characteristic among child victims of PMT, like gender, temperament, or psychopathology. Overall, there is little evidence regarding the child factors that increase risk for being a victim of PMT.…”

“…Although Doyle (1997) has observed that PMT takes place in all layers of society, in all cultures, and in every religion, it is clear that families in which children experience PMT often have financial and social difficulties and live in precarious housing (Chamberland et al 2005;Khamis 2000). Family dynamics and structures are often fragile compared to the population at large.…”