In the United States, two approaches have developed to exercise collective influence on how parents raise their children. One is mandatory public intervention in families who have placed their children at risk, exemplified by the child welfare system. The other is voluntary offers of assistance, for example, child abuse prevention services that…

Child-Parent Psychotherapy (CPP) is an evidence-based mental health intervention for infants and toddlers as well as their adult caregivers. Families with young children in foster care benefit most when it is offered along with an array of other supportive measures (e.g., housing, medical attention). As a core component of the Safe Babies Court…

"Free To Grow"--a national program of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF)--supported efforts by Head Start agencies and their community partners to strengthen the families and neighborhood environments of high-risk preschool children living in low-income communities. The goal was to reduce the children's vulnerability to substance…

The main aim of this article is to consider how the 5-Step Method could be developed to meet the needs of affected family members (AFMs) with children under the age of 18. This would be an entirely new development. This article examines opportunities and challenges within practice and policy and makes suggestions on how the Method could be taken…

"Veteran parents" (VPs), or parents who have experienced challenges concerning their children's health and then mentor other families through similar situations, are widely used for parent support. This model has been adopted by Child Protective Services (CPS) to increase parent engagement. Here, we expand the theoretical discussion of VPs in CPS…

Reports such as this typically begin with a statistic designed to highlight a problem. The girls and boys to whom this edition of "The State of the World's Children" is dedicated are not problems. Rather, each is a sister, brother or friend who has a favourite dish, song or game; a daughter or son with dreams and the desire to fulfil…

In this resource sheet, Dr Higgins examines child abuse and neglect in Indigenous communities from a societal perspective: applying a community development framework to understand effective strategies for reducing risks and enhancing children's safety and wellbeing. To be effective, strategies to address the problem of child abuse in Indigenous…

The prevalence of traumatic stress in the lives of families who are homeless is extraordinarily high. Often these families are headed by single mothers who have experienced ongoing trauma in the form of childhood abuse and neglect, domestic violence, and community violence, as well as the trauma associated with poverty and the loss of home,…

The Promising Practices Network (PPN) on Children, Families and Communities (www.promisingpractices.net) began as a partnership between four state-level organizations that help public and private organizations improve the well-being of children and families. The PPN website, archived in June 2014, featured summaries of programs and practices that…

A population-level approach to deliver parenting and family support is a necessary but neglected approach needed to reduce the high prevalence of emotional/behavioral problems in children, decrease inadequate and potentially abusive parenting practices, and to provide improved parenting support to all parents within a specified population. We…

The Durham Family Initiative (DFI) is one of two community-based child abuse prevention efforts that comprise The Duke Endowment's Child Abuse Prevention Initiative. Beginning in 2002, the Endowment provided support to the Durham Family Initiative (DFI) in North Carolina and Strong Communities in South Carolina to develop a comprehensive approach…

There has been considerable interest in recent years in comparing the operation of social work services for children and families internationally, particularly between Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. Reviewing the respective policy environments and drawing on recent research experience in these three nations, the author…

All OECD governments want to give parents more choice in their work and family decisions. This book looks at the different ways in which governments support families. It seeks to provide answers to questions like: Is spending on family benefits going up, and how does it vary by the age of the child? Has the crisis affected public support for…

This paper operationally defines a set of indicators for the decision to separate the child and family in child abuse cases. Application of the indicators to 152 cases of suspected child abuse in Australia found that severity of abuse, parenting, and the family social system were most predictive of a final separation outcome. (Author/DB)

Identifies and analyzes central tensions and themes that characterize child protection policy in England and Wales. Outlines conflicting messages that have been prevalent in debates about child abuse since the early 1980s. Analyzes in detail the 1989 Children Act, the 1991 Criminal Justice Act, Working Together (1991), and the Memorandum of Good…