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| << Chapter 6 | Appendix A >> |
This chapter describes additional research activities related to child maltreatment including those using data from the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS). The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), other Federal and State agencies, and other organizations have sponsored these studies. Ideas and suggestions for future research also are included.
Child Welfare Outcomes
Child Welfare Outcomes 2002–2005: Report to Congress is the seventh in a series of annual reports from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Children's Bureau. The reports are developed in accordance with section 479A of the Social Security Act (as amended by the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997) and provide information pertaining to State performance on the following national child welfare outcomes.
The outcomes reflect widely accepted performance objectives for child welfare practice. They were established by HHS in consultation with State and local child welfare agency administrators, child advocacy organizations, child welfare researchers, State legislators, and other experts in the child welfare field. The Child Welfare Outcomes reports are designed to inform Congress, the States, and the public about State performance on key child welfare outcomes and change in performance over time. The underlying goal of the reports is to promote continual improvement in the outcomes experienced by children served by child welfare systems throughout the Nation.
This publication incorporates data from NCANDS and Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (AFCARS) on the 12 original outcome measures and data on 15 additional measures that HHS recently developed to assess State performance during the second round of the Child and Family Services Reviews (CFSRs), which began in March 2007. This report is available on the Children's Bureau Web site at www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/cb/pubs/cwo05/index.htm
For further information about Child Welfare Outcomes 2002-2005: Report to Congress, contact:
Sharon Newburg-Rinn, Ph.D.
Social Science Research Analyst
Children's Bureau/ACYF/ACF/HHS
1250 Maryland Avenue, 8th Floor
Washington, DC 20024
202-205-0749
sharon.newburg-rinn@acf.hhs.gov
America's Children in Brief: Key National Indicators of Well-Being, 2008
Each year since 1997, the Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics has published a report on the well-being of children and families. The Forum alternates publishing a detailed report, America's Children: Key National Indicators of Well-Being, with a summary version that highlights selected indicators. This year, the Forum is publishing America's Children in Brief; it will publish the more detailed report in 2009. The Forum updates all indicators and background data on its Web site (http://childstats.gov) annually.
The Forum fosters coordination and integration among 22 Federal agencies that produce or use statistical data on children and families. The America's Children series provides an accessible compendium of indicators drawn from the most reliable official statistics across topics; it is designed to complement other more specialized, technical, or comprehensive reports produced by various Forum agencies.
All the indicators and background measures presented in America's Children in Brief have been used in previous reports by the Forum. Indicators are chosen because they are easy to understand; are based on substantial research connecting them to child well-being; vary across important areas of children's lives; are measured regularly so that they can be updated and show trends over time; and represent large segments of the population, rather than one particular group. The indicators are organized into seven sections, each focusing on a domain relevant to children's lives: Family and Social Environment, Economic Circumstances, Health Care, Physical Environment and Safety, Behavior, Education, and Health. The report can be found online at http://childstats.gov.
For further information about America's Children in Brief: Key National Indicators of Well-Being, 2008, contact:
Shara Godiwalla
Forum Director
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
National Center for Health Statistics
3311 Toledo Rd., Room 6114
Hyattsville, Maryland 20782
301-458-4256
buh7@cdc.gov
Statistical Abstract of the United States
The Statistical Abstract, prepared by the U.S. Census Bureau, contains a collection of statistics on social and economic conditions in the United States. Selected international data also are included. For many years, two tables using NCANDS data have been published. One table reports the characteristics of child victims by maltreatment, sex, age, and race or ethnicity. The second table reports the number of investigations, the number of children who were subjects of investigations, and the number of victims by State.
The 2007 edition of the Statistical Abstract was published and is available on CD-ROM. An online version is available at http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/.
For further information about the Statistical Abstract, contact:
Richard P. Kersey
Statistical Abstract
U.S. Census Bureau
301-763-4428
richard.patrick.kersey@census.gov
National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being
The National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being (NSCAW) is a nationally representative, longitudinal survey that focuses on the well-being of children who have encountered the child welfare system. Data collection with a second longitudinal sample began during 2008.
The NSCAW I core sample of 5,501 children in 36 States represents all children who were investigated for child maltreatment during the 15-month baseline period, which began in October 1999. Children were included whether or not the case was substantiated or founded and whether or not they received child welfare services as a result of the investigation.
The NSCAW II baseline began in March 2008. The NSCAW II design and protocol are very similar to the prior study. Data will be collected from 5,700 children, current caregivers, caseworkers, and teachers sampled from the NSCAW I-selected counties using similar measures. An 18-month followup is scheduled to begin in September 2009. Drawing a new sample of children from the same locations will allow researchers to better gauge the effect of changes in policies, practices, and external constraints like budget resources. NSCAW II data also will include administrative data like that provided by the States for NCANDS and AFCARS, to obtain more complete data about reports, service receipt, and placement history.
The NSCAW data sets represent an important resource for researchers interested in child maltreatment, child welfare, child development, and services to high-risk children and families.
Study reports and research briefs and more information about NSCAW methods and measures are available at http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/opre/abuse_neglect/nscaw/index.html. The data from NSCAW are available to researchers through licensing agreements with the National Data Archive on Child Abuse and Neglect (NDACAN) at Cornell University. For more information on accessing the NSCAW data sets, please see http://www.ndacan.cornell.edu.
For additional information about the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being contact:
Mary Bruce Webb, Ph.D.
Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation/ACF/HHS
370 L'Enfant Promenade, SW
Washington, DC 20447
202–205–8628
mbwebb@acf.hhs.gov
State Policies and Characteristics and their Relationship to County Level Safety Measures
The Child and Family Services Reviews (CFSR) were developed in response to a mandate in the Social Security Amendments of 1994. The CFSR are the HHS results-oriented, comprehensive monitoring system of State performance regarding safety, permanency, and well-being of children who come into contact with public child welfare systems. The CFSR use data from the NCANDS to compute two safety measures:
This analysis examined such CFSR variables as substantiation rates, rereporting, and the receipt of services aggregated at the county level to determine if they predict performance on the two safety measures. NCANDS FFY 2006 data from nearly 1,500 counties in 33 States were used.
The next phase of this analysis will include hierarchal linear modeling to determine if States' characteristics and policies can affect county performance on both safety measures.
For further information about these analyses contact:
Mary Jo Ortiz, M.A.
NCANDS Technical Team
Walter R. McDonald & Associates Inc.
2720 Gateway Oaks Drive, Suite 250
Sacramento, CA 95833
916–239–4020
mjortiz@wrma.com
Nonfatal Maltreatment of Infants—United States, October 2005–September 2006
To determine the extent of nonfatal infant maltreatment in the United States, the CDC and the Federal Administration for Children and Families (ACF) collaborated to perform data analysis on child victims younger than 1 year old. Federal fiscal year (FFY) 2006 NCANDS data were used. This report is the first published national analysis of substantiated nonfatal maltreatment of infants using NCANDS data. During FFY 2006, approximately 904,000 children younger than 18 years were victims of maltreatment that was substantiated by State and local child protective services (CPS) agencies.
The analysis showed that 91,278 unique victims younger than 1 year experienced nonfatal maltreatment. Nearly 40 percent (38.8%) of the infants were younger than 1 month and of those, 84.3 percent (29,881) were younger than 1 week.
For the victims younger than 1 week, 68.5 percent suffered from neglect (including medical neglect) and 13.2 percent from physical abuse. Of the 29,881 victims younger than 1 week, 86.9 percent were reported to CPS agencies by such professionals as medical personnel (19,486 victims) and social services personnel (5,542 victims).
The concentration of reports of neglect in the first few days of life and the preponderance of reports from medical professionals during the same period suggests that neglect often was identified at birth. One hypothesis is that the majority of reports resulted from maternal or newborn drug tests. To view this report in full go to http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5713a2.htm.
For additional information about this analysis, contact:
Rebecca Leeb, Ph.D.
Epidemiologist
Division of Violence Prevention
National Center for Injury Prevention & Control
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
4770 Buford Hwy, NE, Mailstop F–64
Atlanta, GA 30341
770–488–1156
rleeb@cdc.gov
Updated Trends in Child Maltreatment, 2006
The University of New Hampshire Crimes against Children Research Center (CCRC) works to provide high-quality research and statistics to the public, policy makers, law enforcement personnel, and other child welfare practitioners.
CCRC researchers analyzed NCANDS data and other available statistics about neglect, and sexual and physical abuse maltreatment types to examine trends from 1992 to 2006.
Substantiations of sexual abuse declined 53 percent and physical abuse declined 48 percent from 1992 through 2006. Substantiations of neglect have fluctuated during the period since 1992, but have not shown a strong trend either up or down. Since 1992, the majority of States have experienced drops in sexual abuse cases, led by Idaho and Arizona with a 94 percent drop in both States, followed by Alaska (88 percent) and South Dakota (87 percent). Only two States and the District of Columbia experienced increases for that time period.
The researchers also have reviewed hypotheses for why sexual and physical abuse cases have declined including sustained economic improvement, an increased number of law enforcement and child protection personnel, greater public awareness, and new treatment options and services for families including psychiatric medications. More information regarding the analysis can be found at http://www.unh.edu/ccrc/index.html.
For additional information about the Updated Trends in Child Maltreatment, contact:
David Finkelhor
Director
Crimes against Children Research Center
University of New Hampshire
126 Horton Social Science Center
Durham, NH 03824
603–862–1888
david.finkelhor@unh.edu
The National Resource Center for Child Welfare Data and Technology
The National Resource Center for Child Welfare Data and Technology (NRC-CWDT) is a service of the Children's Bureau that provides a broad range of technical assistance to State and Tribal child welfare agencies and the courts about data and systems issues to improve outcomes for children and families.
The Center helps States, Tribes, and courts improve the quality of data collected, build the capacity to use the information for decision-making in daily practice, and develop or improve case management and data collection systems, including Statewide Automated Child Welfare Information Systems (SACWIS). The NRC-CWDT provides technical assistance to States to help improve the quality of data reported to the Federal government in NCANDS, AFCARS, and National Youth in Transition Database (NYTD).
The Center also provides onsite technical assistance for the NCANDS project and technical assistance for the Child and Family Services Reviews process and on other Federal, State, and local legislative requirements, policies, and initiatives. NRC-CWDT coordinates the data conference sponsored by the Children's Bureau, usually held on an annual basis. Additional dissemination of information and promising practices can be found at www.nrccwdt.org.
For further information about the NRC-CWDT, contact:
Lynda Arnold
Director
NRC-CWDT
2345 Crystal Drive,
Suite 250
Arlington, VA 22202
877–672–4829
larnold@cwla.org
Community-Based Grants for the Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect (CBCAP)
The CBCAP program provides funding to States for the purposes of:
NCANDS data are used to assess CBCAP's performance on the effectiveness of CBCAP- sponsored primary prevention efforts with regard to:
For further information regarding the CBCAP program, contact:
Melissa Brodowski, M.S.W./M.P.H.
Office on Child Abuse and Neglect
Children's Bureau, ACYF, ACF, HHS
1250 Maryland Ave., SW,
8th Floor
Washington, DC 20024
202–205–2629
melissa.brodowski@acf.hhs.gov
Non-Resident Fathers in Child Welfare
The Quality Improvement Center on Non-Resident Fathers in Child Welfare (QIC-NRF) is a pro gram of the Children's Bureau operated under by American Humane Association and its partners, the American Bar Association Center for Children and the Law and the National Fatherhood Initiative, under a cooperative agreement. There are three purposes of the QIC-NRF:
Efforts of child protection and child welfare professionals in identifying, locating, contacting and engaging non-resident fathers are a focus for system improvement. The QIC-NRF uses the 6–month recurrence rate of child victimization as a safety indicator. Computations were the same as for the NCANDS Safety Profile using data from States that reported data on the living arrangement of child victims. When the child victim was initially living with parents of known marital status, either married or unmarried, the 6–month recurrence rate was 7.3 percent. When the child was initially living with the mother, the 6–month recurrence rate was 8.6 percent. The 6–month recurrence rate was 11.4 percent for a child living in a home in which parental marital status was unknown or the mother was living with another adult.
The QIC-NRF attention to children in foster care will enable the available information about non-resident fathers to be expanded through the use of the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (AFCARS) data. Caretaker family status is a field in AFCARS that is a counterpart to the NCANDS living arrangement field. However, reported data on caretaker family status in AFCARS is more comprehensive than reported data on child living arrangement in NCANDS. For States using common encryption of child identifiers in NCANDS and AFCARS, the caretaker family status value will be merged from the AFCARS file to the NCANDS file. These data will help to provide baseline child maltreatment recurrence results in the assessment of intervention program effects.
Preliminary analysis of results from two States yielded a 6–month recurrence rate for children with married family caretaker status of 10.1 percent and for children with single female family caretaker status of 12.7 percent. The 6–month recurrence rate for children with unmarried family caretaker status was 11.9 percent, but that result is equivocal because it is unknown if the unmarried caretakers were both biological parents. Additional research is being conducted.
For further information about the Quality Improvement Center on Non-Resident Fathers in
Child Welfare contact:
Sonia Velazquez, CSS
Principal Investigator, QIC-NRF
American Humane Association
62 Inverness Drive East
Englewood, CO 80112
svelazquez@americanhumane.org
Researchers interested in using the NCANDS data can apply to the National Data Archive on Child Abuse and Neglect for access to various data files. The NCANDS data are available for trend analysis; single State, single year analysis and for use in conjunction with other data sets or data sources. Some suggestions of topics for future research are listed below. A description of the National Data Archive also is provided.
National Data Archive on Child Abuse and Neglect
The National Data Archive on Child Abuse and Neglect (NDACAN) has been established by the Children's Bureau to encourage scholars to use existing child maltreatment data sources in their research. NDACAN acquires data sets from various national data collection efforts and from individual researchers, prepares the data and documentation for secondary analysis, and disseminates the data sets to researchers who have been licensed to use the data.
The Child File is the case-level component of the NCANDS. Child File data consist of all investigations or assessments of alleged child maltreatment that received a disposition in the reporting year. Records are provided at the level of each child on a report, also known as the report-child pair. Data elements include the demographics of children and their perpetrators, types of maltreatment, investigation or assessment dispositions, risk factors, and services provided as a result of the investigation or assessment. The following Child File data sets are available.
| Data submission year | Number of States in the data set |
|---|---|
2000 |
20 |
2001 |
23 (including DC) |
2002 |
23 (including DC) |
2003 |
23 (including DC) |
2004 |
45 (including DC) |
2005 |
49 (including DC) |
2006 |
51 (including DC and PR) |
Information regarding NDACAN, its services, and data holdings can be found on the Internet at http://www.ndacan.cornell.edu.
For more information about access to NDACAN, researchers may contact:
John Eckenrode, Ph.D.
Director
National Data Archive on Child Abuse and Neglect
Family Life Development Center—Beebe Hall
Cornell University
Ithaca, NY 14853
607–255–7799
jje1@cornell.edu
| << Chapter 6 | Appendix A >> |
