Child Neglect and Abuse Quiz

Child Neglect and Abuse

• The Convention on the Rights of the Child considers anyone a child until they turn 18.
• Examples of child neglect involve:
  • An 8-year-old child, Mark, left to care for his 3-year-old sister, Maria, while their parents are out.
  • A mother, Margaret, failing to give medication to her 10-year-old seizure-disordered daughter.
  • A father, Jonathan, refusing to let his 16-year-old son return home.
  • Tyrone and Rachel living with their three children in a dirty, urine-smelling home with rotten food.
  • Alicia leaving her 10-month-old infant unattended in a bathtub full of water.

Child Neglect Definition

• Child neglect is a failure to act.
• Parents or caregivers are not performing actions they should for their children.
• It is a failure to meet the minimum standards of care, not a failure to provide ideal care.
• This includes neglecting health, education, emotional development, nutrition, shelter, and safe living conditions that harm a child's health or development in any way.
• This also includes failing to adequately supervise and protect children from harm as much as possible (WHO).

Suspected Child Neglect

• If a child is suspected of being neglected, consider if the inadequate attention, behavior, or indifference towards the child is due to poverty or lack of resources.
• Are the behaviors intentional?

Types of Child Neglect

• Prenatal (Fetal) Neglect: Actions of a pregnant woman that harm the unborn child. Often includes drug or alcohol abuse.
• Physical Neglect: Failing to meet a child's basic health care needs. Failing to protect the child from preventable diseases. Failing to seek urgent or necessary medical treatment. Leaving a child alone unsupervised for extended periods. Not knowing or caring about the child's whereabouts until late at night. Failing to provide the child with regular, nutritious meals and clean/adequate clothing.
• Educational Neglect: The child's developmental and educational needs are not met. This includes permitting truancy, failing to send a child to school or enroll him in school, and inattention to special educational needs.
• Emotional Neglect: Showing insufficient attention and affection. Allowing the child to witness domestic maltreatment or violence. Allowing the child to use alcohol and/or drugs. Supporting or allowing a child's maladaptive behavior. Preventing or delaying professional psychological support for the child.

Prenatal Neglect Details

• Drinking during pregnancy is a leading cause of preventable fetal death, fetal malformations, and neurodevelopmental problems.
• Maternal alcohol consumption significantly increases the risk of spontaneous abortion.
• Research shows children born to mothers who drank heavily during pregnancy often have growth deficiencies, brain structure and function anomalies, mental retardation, and head and face abnormalities (Streissguth, 1997).
• Maternal alcohol consumption has been linked to placental abruption (Aliyu et al., 2011).
• Moderate drinking has been linked to low birth weight and neonatal asphyxia (Meyer-Leu et al., 2011).
• Fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) is a series of birth defects resulting from a mother's alcohol consumption during pregnancy, causing problems including intellectual disability, low birth weight, and abnormalities to the head and face, and growth deficiencies.

Physical Neglect (Examples)

• Subtypes of physical neglect are categorized into health care neglect, personal hygiene neglect, nutritional neglect, neglect of household safety, neglect of household sanitation, inadequate shelter, and abandonment.

Educational Neglect (Examples)

• Permitting truancy
• Failing to send a child to school
• Ignoring special educational needs

Emotional Neglect (Examples)

• Lack of attention and affection
• Allowing witness to domestic abuse
• Allowing substance abuse

Neglectful Parents

• Neglectful parents interact with their children less, and when they do, interactions are less positive.
• Interactions between neglectful parents and their children are often characterized by less empathy.
• Studies show higher rates of neglect in low-income families with unemployment and dependence on social assistance.
• Depression, chronic illnesses, substance abuse can be risk factors for child neglect among parents.
• Children living with single parents have a heightened risk for neglect.

Indicators of Neglect

• Lack of adequate medical or dental care
• Chronic sleepiness or hunger
• Poor personal hygiene, dirty clothes
• Evidence of poor supervision: Leaving child alone or unsupervised.
• Unsafe home conditions: Fire hazards, inadequate sleeping arrangements.
• Poor quality food (spoiled, inadequate)
• Child begs or steals food
• Frequent absence from school

Risk Factors of Child Neglect

• Inadequate socioeconomic conditions
• Lack of social support/Social isolation
• Caregivers' past experience of violence
• Caregivers' addiction
• Insufficient knowledge of caregivers about child development
• Caregivers becoming parents at a young age
• Beliefs that support or condone violent practices
• Child living with a single parent
• High daily family stress
• Domestic violence

Effects of Neglect

• Disturbed parent-child attachment
• Disturbed peer interactions
• Receptive and expressive language deficits
• Low academic achievement
• Deficits in intelligence/creativity/flexibility/verbal abilities
• Apathy/withdrawal
• Low self-esteem
• Negative affect (anger, frustration)
• Physical/verbal aggression
• Violent delinquency
• Attention problems
• Conduct problems
• Personality disorders
• Psychiatric symptoms (e.g., anxiety, depression, PTSD)
• Failure to thrive
• Death (in extreme cases)
• Obesity
• Cognitive deficits, low IQ, reading ability
• Illegal behavior
• Psychiatric disorders
• Alcohol problems
• Violence against a partner
• Non-organic failure to thrive (NFTT) - failing to reach normal milestones for physical growth despite having no known organic disease.

Test your knowledge on the definitions and examples of child neglect and abuse. This quiz covers various forms of neglect as outlined by the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Understand the responsibilities of caregivers and the impact of neglect on children's lives.