Chapter 10 Intervention: Reporting, Investigation, and Assessment Culturally Sensitive Intervention: Cultural Competence Defined • Culture: goes beyond race and ethnicity, including religious identification, gender identity/expression, & sexual orientation. • Cultural Competence: “a heightened consciousness of how culturally diverse populations experience their uniqueness and deal with their differences and similarities within a larger social context” (NASW, 2015, p.10) Culturally Sensitive Intervention: Putting Cultural Competence into Practice • Determine family’s level of acculturation and the reason for their immigration • Assess how the family views a social worker’s power • Understand how the family views itself, and their sense of family cohesion • Acknowledge varying communication styles • Learn about culture, but do not over-generalize • Consult with bilingual and bicultural staff • Know how one’s (helping professional’s) own values interface with the client’s Understanding the Intervention Process: Reporting • Mandated reporters: individuals who, in their professional relationship with the child and family, may encounter child maltreatment. • State laws specify repointing agency, reportable conditions, responsibility of mandated reporters, and the investigation process • Although anonymous reports may be accepted, they are not preferred since they do not allow for follow-up questions Understanding the Intervention Process: Child Protection Teams • Child Protection Teams (CPT): comprised of staff from different disciplines • Ex) School-based CPT include an administrator, a guidance counselor, school nurse, and one or two teachers. • Suspicions of child maltreatment are brought to CPT. • If CPT agrees with the report, then the child protection agency is notified. • CPTs are effective in medical facilities & churches. Understanding the Intervention Process: Investigation & Assessment • Intake worker meets with the child & his/her family to assess risk, protective factors, and impact of disclosure on stability of the family • If the report is substantiated, the worker identifies goals and strategies for the family • If unsubstantiated, the case is referred or closed • Treatment planning and services begins • Must evaluate the family’s progress and revise service plan as necessary Understanding the Intervention Process: Family Reactions & Home Visiting • The family is in a state of crisis, disequilibrium, when disclosure takes place, experiencing fear: fear of authority, fear of having the child removed, the fear of helplessness. • Responses (defense mechanisms) to fear: denial, projection, blaming the system, antagonism towards social services, or withdrawal. • Workers must evaluate the family’s strengths too. • Home visitation allows assessment, but also requires additional sensitivity and interviewing skills. Assessing Risk and Protective Factors • Is the ...

1. Chapter 10
Intervention: Reporting, Investigation, and Assessment
Culturally Sensitive Intervention:
Cultural Competence Defined
• Culture: goes beyond race and ethnicity, including religious
identification, gender identity/expression, & sexual
orientation.
• Cultural Competence: “a heightened consciousness of how
culturally diverse populations experience their uniqueness
and deal with their differences and similarities within a larger
social context” (NASW, 2015, p.10)
Culturally Sensitive Intervention: Putting
Cultural Competence into Practice
• Determine family’s level of acculturation and the reason for
their immigration
• Assess how the family views a social worker’s power
• Understand how the family views itself, and their sense of
family cohesion
• Acknowledge varying communication styles

2. • Learn about culture, but do not over-generalize
• Consult with bilingual and bicultural staff
• Know how one’s (helping professional’s) own values interface
with the client’s
Understanding the Intervention
Process: Reporting
• Mandated reporters: individuals who, in their professional
relationship with the child and family, may encounter child
maltreatment.
• State laws specify repointing agency, reportable conditions,
responsibility of mandated reporters, and the investigation
process
• Although anonymous reports may be accepted, they are not
preferred since they do not allow for follow-up questions
Understanding the Intervention
Process: Child Protection Teams
• Child Protection Teams (CPT): comprised of staff from
different disciplines
• Ex) School-based CPT include an administrator, a guidance
counselor, school nurse, and one or two teachers.
• Suspicions of child maltreatment are brought to CPT.

3. • If CPT agrees with the report, then the child protection
agency is notified.
• CPTs are effective in medical facilities & churches.
Understanding the Intervention Process:
Investigation & Assessment
• Intake worker meets with the child & his/her family to assess
risk, protective factors, and impact of disclosure on stability of
the family
• If the report is substantiated, the worker identifies goals and
strategies for the family
• If unsubstantiated, the case is referred or closed
• Treatment planning and services begins
• Must evaluate the family’s progress and revise service plan as
necessary
Understanding the Intervention Process:
Family Reactions & Home Visiting
• The family is in a state of crisis, disequilibrium, when
disclosure takes place, experiencing fear: fear of authority,
fear of having the child removed, the fear of helplessness.
• Responses (defense mechanisms) to fear: denial, projection,
blaming the system, antagonism towards social services, or

4. withdrawal.
• Workers must evaluate the family’s strengths too.
• Home visitation allows assessment, but also requires
additional sensitivity and interviewing skills.
Assessing Risk and Protective
Factors
• Is the child at risk from abuse or neglect, and to what degree?
• What is causing the problem?
• What are the strengths or protective factors that could be
built on with services to alleviate the problem?
• Is the home a safe environment or must the child be placed?
• Essential information: parental history and family functioning,
parent’s view of child, & environmental factors and supports
Interviewing for Assessment
• Ask questions designed to assess the potential risk of the
home situation and the capacity of the parents to cope with
child rearing.
• Use non-leading questions; avoid blaming; recognize the
client’s feelings
• Interview the child in a nonthreatening setting; adjust to
child’s developmental level and language preferences,

5. including names of body parts; allow for stories, metaphors,
and drawings
Handling Emergencies
• Emergencies: imminent danger to the child, child
abandonment, or if the parents are not cooperating.
• Require an immediate decision on whether to involve the
court system, remove the child from home, or both; need
assessment to determine who should have custody of the
children and the impact that this will have on the children.
C A S E M A N A G E M E N T A N D T R E A T M E N T O
F P H Y S I C A L
A B U S E A N D N E G L E C T
CHAPTER 13
CASE MANAGEMENT
• Case management: the ongoing work with families
to
• set & review goals/outcomes
• make plans to achieve those goals

6. • identify & select needed services
• collaborate with servicer providers
• monitor progress
• provide emotional support
• maintain records
• prepare documentation and reports
CAUTIONS FOR CASE WORKERS
• counter-transference: the worker’s reaction to the
client (feelings, attitudes, thoughts and behaviors),
which is brought about by the helper’s own past life
experiences
• must become aware of it so that helper’s own actions do
not negatively influence the service being provided.
• Confidentiality may need to be broken if the client
threatens or attempt suicide, threatens to kill
another, of abuse/neglect a child: must be
reported.

7. POTENTIAL TREATMENT SERVICES
• Therapy: art; cognitive processing; trauma-focused
play, integrative-eclectic, cognitive-behavioral;
parent-child interaction, & intensive family
preservation.
• Education: early childhood program, resilient peer
training intervention, parent-child education for
physically abusive parents
• Care: eye movement desensitization and
reprocessing (EMDR); therapeutic foster care;
parents anonymous, Inc.; family preservation
services
PROVIDING TREATMENT: CLIENT
RESPONSE
• Engaging families in treatment can be difficult:
• showing difficulty in trusting others
• exhibit personality disorder, intolerant of a lengthy treatment

8. process
• have communication/cultural misunderstandings
• Treatment can provoke loyalty conflicts in children.
• Families are not always eligible for treatment by
appropriate agencies.
• Resources to treat may be limited.
WHO PROVIDES TREATMENT & HOW
LONG?
• Family preservation agencies, often with the aid of
grans and independent of child protective services,
provide a full range of treatment services.
• The duration of treatment: specific guidelines
measure when families are ready for termination:
parents must demonstrate the following:
• be more aware of their own needs and how to get them
met
• be able to reach out for help in the future

9. • be able to communicate more effectively
• feel more positively toward their children
TREATMENT OF NEGLECTFUL FAMILIES
• Neglectful families may be especially resistant to
treatment and necessitate family-centered
services.
• In-Home Family-Centered Services: intensive, short-term,
family-based services; voluntary, crisis prevention services to
promote healthy functioning
• Shared Family Care: out-of-home care in which host
caregivers and the parent(s) care for the children
simultaneously; skills building model promotes parental
responsibility and resource development
• The goal to help the family to function & improve
their parenting skills so that the family can remain
together.
TREATMENT OF PHYSICALLY ABUSIVE
FAMILIES
• The primary goal of treatment with physically
abusive family is for the battering to cease and the
parents to develop coping skills for the future.

10. • Treatment for the child
• attending to the medical problem resulting from the abuse
• providing a safer environment
• attending to the psychological scars from the abuse.
• TF-CBT: trauma-focused cognitive behavioral therapy
TREATMENT FOR THE PHYSICALLY
ABUSED CHILD
• Psychological Services:
• Trauma-focused cognitive behavioural therapy (TF-CBT)
• Therapies to help with self-concept & affect
• Remedial Services:
• Motor skills, cognitive development, & individualized
education plan (IEP)
• Socialization Services:
• Aggressiveness leads to cycle of poor peer relations
TREATMENT OF THE PARENTS &
SIBLINGS

11. • Abusive parents also need to be treated for their
own traumatic pasts, in developing better
relationships with their children and in learning more
effective parenting skills, including appropriate
disciplinary techniques.
• Parent-child interaction therapy (PCIT)
• parent–child relationships
• parenting skills
• Alternatives for families cognitive-behavioral
therapy (AF-CBT)
• targets violent/abusive behaviors
Chapter 4
The Neglect of Children
Definition and Impact of
Neglect
• Neglect: an act of omission related to parental deficits
• Physical neglect: non-organic failure to thrive, abandonment,

12. failure
to meet basic physical needs
• Inadequate supervision
• Medical neglect, educational neglect, emotional neglect,
mental
health neglect
• Stimulation neglect, language neglect, gross/fine motor
neglect
• Environmental neglect
• Neglect is the most common form of Child abuse
• In the U.S., neglect accounts for 78% of all child maltreatment
cases,
far more than physical abuse (17%), sexual abuse (9%), and
psychological abuse (8%) combined.
• Video – In Brief: The Science of Neglect –
https://youtu.be/bF3j5UVCSCA
• Video – Still Face Experiment: Dr. Edward Tronic –
https://youtu.be/apzXGEbZht0
https://youtu.be/bF3j5UVCSCA
https://youtu.be/apzXGEbZht0
4 Types of Unresponsive Care
Impacts of Neglect of Child
Development

13. The absence of responsive relationships poses a serious threat to
a child’s
development and well-being.
• Sensing threat activates biological stress response systems,
and excessive
activation of those systems can have a toxic effect on
developing brain circuitry.
When the lack of responsiveness persists, the adverse effects of
toxic stress can
compound the lost opportunities for development associated
with limited or
ineffective interaction. This complex impact of neglect on the
developing brain
underscores why it is so harmful in the earliest years of life. It
also demonstrates
why effective early interventions are likely to pay significant
dividends in better
long-term outcomes in educational achievement, lifelong health,
and successful
parenting of the next generation.
Chronic neglect is associated with a wider range of damage than
active abuse, but
it receives less attention in policy and practice.
• Science tells us that young children who experience
significantly limited
caregiver responsiveness may sustain a range of adverse
physical and mental
health consequences that actually produce more widespread
developmental
impairments than overt physical abuse. These can include
cognitive delays,
stunting of physical growth, impairments in executive function
and self-

14. regulation skills, and disruptions of the body’s stress response.
https://developingchild.harvard.edu/science/key-concepts/serve-
and-return/
https://developingchild.harvard.edu/science/key-concepts/toxic-
stress/
https://developingchild.harvard.edu/science/deep-dives/lifelong-
health/
https://developingchild.harvard.edu/science/deep-dives/lifelong-
health/
https://developingchild.harvard.edu/science/deep-dives/mental-
health/
https://developingchild.harvard.edu/science/key-
concepts/executive-function/
Brain Scan of two Infants
• In the well-developed brain
on the left, rich areas of red
and orange depicting high
activity; on the right, a few
lobes of orange in a sea of
black empty space where
there should be active tissue.
• The deprived brain was that
of a Romanian orphan in the
1990s. Rarely held or
snuggled, much less removed
from her crib, this poor
child’s brain never had the
kind of stimulation it
required to grow
appropriately.

15. The Measurement of Neglect: Child
Neglect Index (CNI)
• Supervision
• Extent to which parent anticipates risky situations and
intervenes to protect child in an age-appropriate manner;
knowledge of child’s whereabouts
• Physical Care
• Adequate nutrition with regular meals; Hygiene: child is clean
and adequately clothed
• Health Care
• Provides basic medical needs, responds to child’s emotional
needs; ensures developmental and educational needs are met
Risk Factors for Neglect:
• Environmental factors:
• Poverty
• Community characteristics: lack of resources
• Access to social supports
• Ecological factors:
• run-down neighborhoods

16. • systemic oppression
• Parenting factors:
• Difficulties in processing information & affect
• Substance abuse
Neglect & Risk
Factors/Protective Factors
Symptoms & Effects of Neglect:
Infancy/Early Childhood
• Non-organic failure to thrive syndrome:
• Falls below the fifth percentile in weight
• Eats little, lacks interest in environment, shows developmental
lag
• Psychosocial dwarfism:
• Behavioral problems around food and sleep
• Hyperactivity
• Extreme fatigue.
Symptoms & Effects of Neglect:
Young Children

17. • Presence of Pediculosis (lice)
• Poor motor skills
• Language delays
• Lack of medical care: routine and urgent care; immunizations
• Academic problems: difficulty with advanced
conceptualizations and complicated instructions
• Impaired socialization
• Impulsiveness
Brain Scan of two Toddlers
Studies on children in a variety of settings show
that severe deprivation or neglect:
• Disrupts the ways in which children’s brains
develop and process information, increasing
the risk for attentional, emotional, cognitive,
and behavioral disorders.
• Alters the development of biological stress-
response systems, leading to greater risk for
anxiety, depression, cardiovascular problems,
and other chronic health impairments later in
life.
• Correlates with significant risk for emotional
and interpersonal difficulties, including high
levels of negativity, poor impulse control, and

18. personality disorders, as well as low levels of
enthusiasm, confidence, and assertiveness.
• Is associated with significant risk for learning
difficulties and poor school achievement,
including deficits in executive function and
attention regulation, low IQ scores, poor
reading skills, and low rates of high school
graduation.
Parents Who Neglect Children
• Apathetic
• appears to have given up on life
• negative, withdrawn
• Impulsive
• low tolerance
• seeks immediate gratification
• Reactive-depressive
• unable to cope with some stressors
• (i.e. birth of a child, partner leaving)
• Parents with mental Illness

19. Substance-Abusing Families
• Parents under the influence of drugs or alcohol can physically,
sexually, or emotionally abuse their children.
• They are not fully available to provide adequate parenting.
• Prenatal Abuse:
• Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder
• Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome
• HIV infection
Plight of the Parent and the Social
Worker
• Is the neglectful parent the adversary?
• The neglectful parent is still the whole world to the child
• The child sees the condemnation of their parents as a rejection
of themselves.
•
Solution
is not simple: the cycle must be broken.
• Removal of the children?

20. • ‘Parenting’ of the parents!
Chapter 1
The Maltreatment of
Children Then and Now
Early Views of Children
could decide their life, death, or discipline.
Infanticide is a term referring to the killing an infant within a
year
of birth, typically carried out by the parents of the child.

21. tion of children
while pederasty for boys were a common practice.
romantic relationship between an adult male and a younger
male usually in his teens.
Early Views of Children

22. tate
southern states. Indenture was a popular form of child
labor in the early United States. Indenture also provided
an opportunity for children to be abused. Indenture was
a term used to refer to a to a person being bonded as
an apprentice or laborer.
https://youtu.be/j-fbnS6sSZA
https://youtu.be/j-fbnS6sSZA
Growing Concerns &
Awareness
- provided
refuge from child labor, mostly for white
children

23. neglected by child welfare system
from home and sent to boarding schools
to assimilate them into the White culture
Early Attempts
protection. Dickens was a British writer who wrote an
autobiographical book Oliver Twist and brought the issue of
child abuse to public attention.
hild removed from her home
due to abuse. The case of Mary Ellen, the first child
removed from her home due to abuse, gave rise to a
myriad of reforms, such formation of Society for the
Prevention of Cruelty to Children (SPCC) in 1875 and The

24. Child Welfare League of American in 1920.
Ellen
Wilson: https://youtu.be/GG3OI2JwaYY
C) was founded
https://youtu.be/GG3OI2JwaYY
Early Attempts
Dependent Children (ADC)
-
Child Syndrome” in the Journal of the American
Medical Association. The coining of the term “the
battered Child Syndrome” by C. Henry Kempe
was a result of the discoveries of abuse made by
Caffey and his colleagues when they noticed

25. unexplained breaks on x-rays. The use of this term
furthered both research and treatment efforts.
Child Abuse and Neglect was established.
Further Efforts on Behalf of
Children
t
parents and tribes

26. impact on intervention with abused and neglected
children. The Child Abuse Prevention Act (1974), The
Indian Child Welfare Act (1978) and Family
Preservation and Support Services Act (1993).
Emerging Influences
dysfunction
lifetime
| Dr. Nadine Burke Harris: https://youtu.be/95ovIJ3dsNk
and psychological problems correlated with childhood
maltreatment
Experiences Study (ACE) and Psychological Trauma Theory.

27. Studies have found significant correlation between child
abuse and household dysfunctions.
https://youtu.be/95ovIJ3dsNk
Child Protection Services Now
-informed intervention & treatment
on of multidisciplinary child protection teams
solidifying risk assessment criteria, advocating for child
protection
teams, and offering more family centered services, following
the
model of Family Rehabilitation.

28. (DYFS)
was officially renamed the Division of Child Protection and
Permanency (DCP&P) as way to more precisely define the
agency's
core mission of providing safety, permanency, and well-being
for
New Jersey’s most vulnerable children and families.