Some Policies to Prevent Child Abuse Have No Measurable Effect

A new study in the Child Maltreatment journal raises significant questions about the effectiveness of many state policies designed to combat child abuse.  The results support worries that many policies increase public concern, but do not reduce actual abuse or neglect.

The researchers used data from the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS), a database to which states make voluntary annual reports.  The study authors correlated the data on (1) referrals to protective services and (2) the services' decisions to substantiate cases with various changes in state policies each year from 2005 to 2018.   Many of the policies that they studied correlated with an increase in  the number of reports, indicating heightened concern, but correlated with a decrease in substantiated cases.  

The effect of some policy changes on the number of referrals was not a surprise.  For example, establishing central intake, adding staff, and broadening the definition of maltreatment correlated with increased referrals.  Some effects, however, were quite surprising, particularly in regard to substantiation of abuse or neglect.  The researchers found, for example, that expanding the definition of mandated reporters increased reports of maltreatment but correlated to a much smaller and later increase in substantiated cases.  Broadening the scope of maltreatment (usually adding infants born with positive drug screens) was associated with increased reporting, but decreased substantiation.  In fact, most policy changes were associated with fewer substantiated cases, no matter how much the reporting increased.

Some of the most beloved and popular policies showed no absolutely correlation with reporting or substantiation.  Staff training, public awareness campaigns, and media coverage all showed no measurable difference.  Those efforts may have other benefits (for example, the threat of liability alone requires staff training), but so far there is no evidence that they have any impact on child abuse or neglect.

This is only one study, although it covers a lot of data over a lot of years.  It offers some important data points to consider when developing policy.  Child abuse and neglect are emotional topics, but not all emotionally-satisfying policies will help solve the problem.  We need to find policies that increase not just reports and public concern, but intervention in actual, substantiated cases of maltreatment.