NCJ Number
142863
Journal
Law and Policy Volume: 14 Issue: 2 and 3 Dated: special issue (April/July 1992) Pages: complete issue
Editor(s)
H J Doueck,
M Levine
Date Published
1992
Length
130 pages
Annotation
Seven articles in this special issue on child abuse and neglect discuss issues in the implementation of child-abuse- and neglect reporting statutes, services for children who witness woman battering, legal liability in the use of risk assessment systems, and the use of anatomically correct dolls in interviews with suspected or confirmed victims of child sexual abuse.
Abstract
The first article reviews the 50 State child-abuse-and- neglect reporting statutes and related research. State statutes and relevant empirical research are reviewed within four contexts: the statutes' stated purposes, the persons and institutions required to report, definitions of abuse and neglect, and the consequences of nonreporting. In reviewing the functions of mandatory child maltreatment reporting statutes in professional contexts, the second article considers factors related to both low and high rates of reporting and presents proposals for related social policy. Following a review of the literature on the psychosocial consequences for children who witness woman battering, the third article reports on the findings from interviews with 59 social service professionals regarding their practices of detecting and responding to children who witness woman battering. Other articles discuss legal liability and policy recommendations when using a risk assessment system for identifying and intervening with children at risk for abuse, requirements for the effective use of anatomically correct dolls in child sexual abuse investigations, and professional conduct and ethical issues posed by mandated reporting of suspected child abuse. References accompany each article. For individual articles, see NCJ 142864-70.