Racial Residential Segregation and Disparities in Child Protective Services: A Study of Large U.S. Counties

In the U.S., Black children are overrepresented in Child Protective Services (CPS) reports relative to their share of the population. Although a large body of research has described and delineated possible causes of this disparity, the potential role of racial residential segregation is understudied. Racial residential segregation imposes vastly unequal built and social environments on Black children, including higher rates of poverty and crime and fewer amenities. These under-resourced environments may contribute to disproportionate exposure to maltreatment and related social adversity, to differences in CPS reporting decisions by professionals and community members, and to differences in CPS screening and decision-making. Using data on 584 large counties from the 2019 National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS), this exploratory study examines how county-level racial residential segregation is associated with CPS report and substantiation rates for Black and White children and with the Black-White disparity in CPS report and substantiation rates. Measures of county segregation — dissimilarity and isolation indices — were calculated from the American Community Survey and U.S. Census data. We found that the Black-White CPS report disparity ratio was largest in the most segregated counties. Yet, both Black and White CPS report rates were lower in the most segregated counties compared to counties with low to moderate segregation. The law enforcement–initiated CPS report rate for Black children was especially high in moderately segregated counties compared with both high- and low-segregation counties. Segregation was not associated with CPS substantiation disparities. The highest-disparity counties did not have above-average reporting rates for Black children. Together, these findings suggest that community characteristics may contribute differently to the absolute rates of CPS reports for Black children and the extent of the Black-White disparity within these rates. Racial residential segregation is an important consideration for future research, policy, and program development focused on reducing racial disparities in, and levels of, CPS contact.