TY - JOUR
T1 - The Organizational Context of Substantiation in Child Protective Services Cases
AU - Font, Sarah
AU - Maguire-Jack, Kathryn
N1 - Funding Information:
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: We acknowledge assistance provided by the Population Research Institute at Penn State University, which is supported by an infrastructure grant by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (P2CHD041025). Some data used within this analysis were derived from National Data Archive on Child Abuse and Neglect (NDACAN) restricted data. These data were accessible through contractual arrangements with NDACAN and are solely available through the Cornell Restricted Access Data Center at [email protected]. Neither the collector of the original data, funding agency, nor the National Data Archive on Child Abuse and Neglect bears any responsibility for the analyses or interpretations presented here.
Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2019.
PY - 2021/8
Y1 - 2021/8
N2 - Substantiation of child maltreatment is among the most important decisions made by Child Protective Services and may have wide-reaching implications for child and family well-being. Yet, relatively little research has been undertaken to understand the organizational context of substantiation. Using national population data from the United States, this study examined the associations between state and county contexts with county substantiation rates using multilevel negative binomial regression. The results show that organizational context (policy and practice characteristics) influences substantiation rates. In particular, standards of evidence, alternative options for investigation and disposition of allegations, and workload burden were all significant predictions of substantiation rates. However, the associations of organizational factors and substantiation varied across types of maltreatment allegations; neglect and physical abuse allegations were more heavily influenced by organizational factors than sexual abuse or multi-type maltreatment allegations. Implications for child protection policy and practice are discussed.
AB - Substantiation of child maltreatment is among the most important decisions made by Child Protective Services and may have wide-reaching implications for child and family well-being. Yet, relatively little research has been undertaken to understand the organizational context of substantiation. Using national population data from the United States, this study examined the associations between state and county contexts with county substantiation rates using multilevel negative binomial regression. The results show that organizational context (policy and practice characteristics) influences substantiation rates. In particular, standards of evidence, alternative options for investigation and disposition of allegations, and workload burden were all significant predictions of substantiation rates. However, the associations of organizational factors and substantiation varied across types of maltreatment allegations; neglect and physical abuse allegations were more heavily influenced by organizational factors than sexual abuse or multi-type maltreatment allegations. Implications for child protection policy and practice are discussed.
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U2 - 10.1177/0886260519834996
DO - 10.1177/0886260519834996
M3 - Article
C2 - 30862238
AN - SCOPUS:85063046950
SN - 0886-2605
VL - 36
SP - 7414
EP - 7435
JO - Journal of Interpersonal Violence
JF - Journal of Interpersonal Violence
IS - 15-16
ER -