Societal Factors of Child Maltreatment:Focusing on the Role of Neighborhood Poverty

Bong Joo LeeSeoul National University

Background

The Child Protection System in Korea Revision of Child Welfare Law in 2000 specified

abuse and neglect as a condition requiring child protection through government intervention for the first time in Korea

Before the legislation, there was no law mandating the reporting of suspected child abuse and neglect

The Law Provided definitions of child abuse and neglect Instituted mandated reporting system (24-hour

hotline) Instituted regional child abuse/neglect prevention

centers

Previous Research onChild Maltreatment in Korea

Very limited empirical research on the risk factors of child maltreatment

Most research has focused on psychiatric or psychological factors employing the “medical” model

Very little attention has been given to the social context as risk factors for child maltreatment

With lack of attention to the larger social context in which maltreatment occurs, the perspective can be used as “blaming the victim”

Purpose of the Study

To empirically examine the effects of societal factors on child maltreatment in KoreaTo investigate the relationship

between reported child maltreatment rates and poverty, family structure, level of education, and housing characteristics at the neighborhood level

Public Assistance Receipt in a Korean City

Divorce Rates

Child Maltreatment Rates

Public Assistance and Child Maltreatment Rates in Seoul, Korea

Method

Dependent variable: child maltreatment rates Used administrative data on substantiated reports o

f child maltreatment for 3 years (2002-2004) Through geocoding the addresses in the reports, nei

ghborhoods of the reports were identified (1,233 Dongs in the seven largest Metro areas in Korea)

Method

Independent VariablesPublic assistance receipt ratePer capita property taxDivorce rates% single father households% single mother households% high school graduatesNumber of rooms per person in the

household

A Caution: “Visibility Hypothesis”

The study uses administrative data on substantiated “reports”

The relationship between “reports” and poverty might be due to the fact that poor families are more likely to be “found” by CPS

One pathway for being “found” could be poor families have more frequent contacts with social services

If the visibility hypothesis is true, we can expect that areas with higher public assistance receipt rates will have higher rates of report by social service workers

Analysis

Used Tobit model: the dependent variable has uneven distribution (many Dong’s have 0 report)

Used STATA statistical software to estimate models

Rates of Child Maltreatments

Percent of Reports by Social Service Workers

Independent Variables

Multivariate Analysis Results:Child Maltreatment Rates

Testing the “Visibility Hypothesis”:Do poor neighborhoods have more reports by social service workers?

Conclusion The first study in Korea to examine the

relationship between community’s socioeconomic characteristics and child maltreatment using neighborhood level indicators

The results show that neighborhoods with higher rates of public assistance receipt, divorce rates, and lower levels of property tax have higher rates of child maltreatment (verified that the results are not likely due to the “visibility effect”)

Intervention efforts of child abuse and neglect should go beyond focusing on individual perpetrators and/or child victims to altering neighborhood characteristics

Efforts to prevent child maltreatment should focus on neighborhood disorganization factors, such as neighborhood poverty and family dissolution