NCJ Number
93212
Journal
Child Abuse and Neglect Volume: 6 Issue: 4 Dated: (1982) Pages: 433-441
Date Published
1982
Length
9 pages
Annotation
The creative use of games, exercises, and materials are among the approaches used by London's Brent Family Service Unit (England) to bring about the changes in behavior and attitudes in families experiencing child abuse.
Abstract
The Brent Unit staff consists of a unit organizer, three social workers, two education and play workers, a neighborhood worker, a community service volunteer, an administrator, a secretary, and social work students. The mix of staff is integrated to create a team approach to child abuse as well as other family issues, which results in the creativity and flexibility required to respond to a multifaceted problem. All staff have controlled and limited workloads that permit frequent and consistent contact with families, and the absence of formality and bureaucracy yields an immediate response to problems. Contracts with individual family members and families as a group draw clients into the change process as they are encouraged to identify and set goals for change. The emphasis in the contracts is upon building from existing strengths to achieve manageable goals, however limited. Activities may be oriented toward helping the total family, particular parent-child relationships, bringing parents and children together, individual children, bringing parents together, and bringing children together. No thorough evaluative research on the program has occurred, but there are signs of success. As families have participated in the program, they have increased their abilities to resolve their own problems, indicated by lessened demands on the unit and other welfare agencies. The incidence and frequency of child abuse involving physical injuries have noticeably been reduced. The monitoring of contracts indicates that parents have been more physically affectionate with their children, adopted more realistic expectations of their children, used more appropriate discipline techniques, and developed more constructive role modeling. One reference is provided.