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Chapter 3
Children¹
Child Maltreatment 2006

Each State has its own definitions of child abuse and neglect based on standards set by Federal law. Federal legislation provides a foundation for States by identifying a minimum set of acts or behaviors that defines child abuse and neglect. The Federal Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA), (42 U.S.C.A. §5106g), as amended by the Keeping Children and Families Safe Act of 2003, defines child abuse and neglect as:

• Any recent act or failure to act on the part of a parent or caretaker which results in death, serious physical or emotional harm, sexual abuse or exploitation; or
• An act or failure to act which presents an imminent risk of serious harm.

Child protective services (CPS) agencies respond to the needs of children who are alleged to have been maltreated to ensure that they are safe. National estimates for FFY 2006 are based on child populations for the 50 States, the District of Columbia, and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. During Federal fiscal year (FFY) 2006:

• An estimated 905,000 children were victims of maltreatment;
• The rate of victimization was 12.1 per 1,000 children in the population; and
• Nearly 3.6 million children received a CPS investigation or assessment.

This chapter discusses the 5-year trend of children who received an investigation or assessment and the 5-year trend of victimization rates. The remainder of the chapter provides more in-depth information about the characteristics of children who were abused or neglected.

Children Who Were Subjects of an Investigation

Based on a rate of 47.8 per 1,000 children, an estimated 3.6 million children received an investigation by CPS agencies during FFY 2006.² The rate of all children who received an investigation or assessment increased from 43.8 per 1,000 children for 2002 to 47.8 per 1,000 children for FFY 2006.³ The national estimates are based upon counting a child each time he or she was the subject of a CPS investigation (figure 3-1).

Child Victims

Of the children who received an investigation, approximately one-quarter (25.2%) were determined to have been abused or neglected. Based on a victim rate of 12.1 per 1,000 children, an estimated 905,000 children were found to be victims in the 52 States.⁴ The victimization rates by individual State are illustrated in figure 3-2.

The rate of victimization decreased from 12.3 per 1,000 during 2002, to 12.1 per 1,000 children during FFY 2006, which is a 1.6 percent decrease. State-specific, 5-year trends illustrate that 28 States decreased their rate from 2002 to 2006, while 22 States increased their rate. Two States were not able to provide data for this analysis.⁵

First-Time Victims

Nearly three-quarters of victims (74.7%) had no history of prior victimization.⁶ Information regarding first-time victims is a Program Assessment Rating Tool (PART) measure. The Community-Based Child Abuse Prevention Program reports this PART measure to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) each year as an average of all States. Individual State data are not reported to OMB.

Types of Maltreatment

During FFY 2006, 64.1 percent of victims experienced neglect, 16.0 percent were physically abused, 8.8 percent were sexually abused, 6.6 percent were psychologically maltreated, and 2.2 percent were medically neglected.⁷ In addition, 15.1 percent of victims experienced such "other" types of maltreatment as "abandonment," "threats of harm to the child," or "congenital drug addiction." States may code any condition that does not fall into one of the main categories—physical abuse, neglect, medical neglect, sexual abuse, and psychological or emotional maltreatment—as "other." These maltreatment type percentages total more than 100 percent because children who were victims of more than one type of maltreatment were counted for each maltreatment.

The data for victims of specific types of maltreatment were analyzed in terms of the report sources. Of victims of physical abuse, 24.2 percent were reported by teachers, 23.1 percent were reported by police officers or lawyers, and 12.1 percent were reported by medical staff.⁸ Overall, 74.9 percent were reported by professionals and 25.1 percent were reported by nonprofessionals. The patterns of reporting of neglect and sexual abuse victims were similar—police officers or lawyers accounted for the largest report source percentage of neglect victims (27.1%) and the largest percentage of sexual abuse victims (28.1%).

Sex and Age of Victims

For FFY 2006, 48.2 percent of child victims were boys, and 51.5 percent of the victims were girls.⁹ The youngest children had the highest rate of victimization. The rate of child victimization for the age group of birth to 1 year was 24.4 per 1,000 children of the same age group. The victimization rate for children in the age group of 1–3 years was 14.2 per 1,000 children in the same age group. The victimization rate for children in the age group of 4–7 years was 13.5 per 1,000 children in the same age group.¹⁰ Overall, the rate of victimization was inversely related to the age group of the child (figure 3-3).

Nearly three-quarters of child victims (72.2%) ages birth to 1 year and age group of 1–3 (72.9%) were neglected compared with 55.0 percent of victims ages 16 years and older. For victims in the age group of 4–7 years 15.3 percent were physically abused and 8.2 percent were sexually abused, compared with 20.1 percent and 16.5 percent, respectively, for victims in the age group of 12–15 years old.¹¹

Race and Ethnicity of Victims

African-American children, American Indian or Alaska Native children, and children of multiple races had the highest rates of victimization at 19.8, 15.9, and 15.4 per 1,000 children of the same race or ethnicity, respectively (figure 3-4). White children and Hispanic children had rates of approximately 10.7 and 10.8 per 1,000 children of the same race or ethnicity, respectively. Asian children had the lowest rate of 2.5 per 1,000 children of the same race or ethnicity.¹²

One-half of all victims were White (48.8); almost one-quarter (22.8) were African-American; and 18.4 percent were Hispanic. For all racial categories except Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander, the largest percentage of victims suffered from neglect.¹³

Living Arrangement of Victims

Data are incomplete for the living arrangement of victims. Slightly more than one-half of the States (28) reported on the living arrangement of victims during the alleged abuse or neglect. Among these 28 States, nearly 40.0 percent (37.3%) of the victims had unknown or missing data on living arrangement and were excluded from the analysis. Approximately 27 percent (26.7%) of victims were living with a single mother. Nearly 20 percent (19.7%) of victims were living with married parents, while approximately 22 percent of victims (21.6%) were living with both parents but the marital status was unknown. It is hoped that the reporting of this data element will improve in the coming years.

Reported Disability of Victims

Children who were reported with any of the following risk factors were considered as having a disability: mental retardation, emotional disturbance, visual or hearing impairment, learning disability, physical disability, behavioral problems, or another medical problem. In general, children with such risk factors are undercounted, as not every child receives a clinical diagnostic assessment from CPS agency staff. Nearly 8 percent (7.7%) of victims had a reported disability. Three percent of victims had behavior problems and 1.9 percent of victims were emotionally disturbed. A victim could have been reported with more than one type of disability.¹⁴

Factors Influencing the Determination That a Child is a Victim of Maltreatment

The determination as to whether or not a child is considered a victim of maltreatment is made during a CPS investigation. A multivariate analysis was conducted to examine whether some child characteristics or circumstances place children at a greater risk for being identified as victims during the investigation process. The odds ratio analyses indicate the likelihood that an allegation of maltreatment is confirmed by the CPS agency. Highlights of the findings are listed below.¹⁵

• Children with allegations of multiple types of maltreatment were nearly four times more likely to be considered a victim of maltreatment than were children with allegations of physical abuse. Children with allegations of sexual abuse were nearly twice as likely to be considered victims, and children with allegations of neglect and other abuse types were also significantly more likely to be considered victims than children with allegations of physical abuse.
• Children who were reported as disabled were 54 percent more likely to be considered a victim of maltreatment than children who were not reported as disabled.
• The likelihood of being considered a victim declined, compared with infants, as the age of the children increased.
• Children who were reported by educational personnel were more than twice as likely to be considered a victim of maltreatment as children reported by social and mental health personnel.

Recurrence

For many victims who have experienced repeat maltreatment, the efforts of the CPS system have not been successful in preventing subsequent victimization. Through the Child and Family Services Reviews (CFSR), the Children's Bureau has established the current national standard for the absence of maltreatment recurrence as 94.6 percent, defined as:

"Absence of Maltreatment Recurrence. Of all children who were victims of substantiated or indicated abuse or neglect during the first 6 months of the reporting year, what percent did not experience another incident of substantiated or indicated abuse or neglect within a 6-month period?"¹⁶

The number of States in compliance with this standard has increased from 17 States for FFY 2004 to 23 States for FFY 2006.¹⁷ During FFY 2006, five States were unable to use the Child File to compute this measure. The national average percent—the average percentage of all States that is reported to the Office of Management and Budget—increased from 91.9 during FFY 2004 to 92.2 for FFY 2006.

Thirty-six States provided sufficient data to support an analysis of the factors that influence the likelihood of recurrence.¹⁸ In this analysis, recurrence was defined as a second substantiated or indicated maltreatment occurring within a 6-month period (183 days). The major results of the analysis are summarized below.

• Children who had been prior victims of maltreatment were 96 percent more likely to experience a recurrence than those who were not prior victims.
• Child victims who were reported with a disability were 52 percent more likely to experience recurrence than children without a disability.
• The oldest victims (16–21 years of age) were the least likely to experience a recurrence, and were 51 percent less likely than were infants (younger than age 1).

Victims by Relationship to Perpetrators

Nearly 83 percent (82.4%) of victims were abused by a parent acting alone or with another person. Approximately, 40 percent (39.9%) of child victims were maltreated by their mothers acting alone; another 17.6 percent were maltreated by their fathers acting alone; and 17.8 percent were abused by both parents.¹⁹ Victims abused by nonparental perpetrators accounted for 10.0 percent (figure 3-5). A nonparental perpetrator is defined as a caregiver who is not a parent and can include foster parent, child daycare staff, unmarried partner of parent, legal guardian, and residential facility staff.

The data for victims of specific maltreatment types were analyzed in terms of perpetrator relationship to the victim. Of the victims who experienced neglect, 86.7 percent were neglected by a parent. Of the victims who were sexually abused, 26.2 percent were abused by a parent and 29.1 percent were abused by a relative other than a parent.²⁰

Maltreatment in Foster Care

Through the CFSR, the Children's Bureau established a national standard for the absence of maltreatment in foster care as 99.68 percent, defined as:

"Absence of Maltreatment in Foster Care. Of all children in foster care during the reporting period, what percent were not victims of a substantiated or indicated maltreatment by foster parents or facility staff members?"²¹

The number of States in compliance has increased from 16 States that met this standard for FFY 2004 to 19 States for FFY 2006.²² During FFY 2006, 5 States were unable to provide the data needed to compute this measure using the Child File. The national average percent decreased from 99.53 during FFY 2004 to 99.49 during FFY 2006.

Tables and Notes

The following pages contain the tables referenced in Chapter 3. Unless otherwise explained, a blank indicates that the State did not submit usable data. Specific information about State submissions can be found in appendix D. Additional information regarding methodologies that were used to create the tables is provided below.

Table 3-1

• The child disposition rate was computed by dividing the total count of children who were the subjects of an investigation (3,511,590) by the child population for the 51 States that reported these data (73,393,682) and multiplying by 1,000.
• Maryland did not submit NCANDS data in FFY 2006.
• Many States investigate all children in the family. Siblings who were not the subject of an allegation and were not found as victims of maltreatment are categorized as no alleged maltreatment.

Table 3-2

• The disposition rate and the victim rate were computed by dividing the respective actual total counts of children by the population in reporting States and multiplying by 1,000.
• The numbers of total estimated children who were subjects of an investigation and total estimated victims are rounded to the nearest 1,000. If fewer than 52 States reported data in a given year, the total is an estimate based on multiplying the rate by the national child population for that year.

Table 3-3

• The rate of victims for each State was based on their number of victims divided by the State's child population, multiplied by 1,000.

Table 3-5

• Only children with substantiated, indicated, or alternative response victim dispositions or a maltreatment death are included in this table.

Table 3-6

• A child may have been the victim of more than one type of maltreatment, and therefore, the total percent may equal more than 100.0.

Table 3-8

• Rates were based on the number of boy or girl victims divided by the boy or girl population, respectively, and multiplied by 1,000.

Table 3-9

• As this table does not contain data of children with unknown or missing age, the sum in the total column is not the total number of reported victims, but a sum of the data from the table by State.

Table 3-10

• A child may have been the victim of more than one type of maltreatment, and therefore, the total percent may equal more than 100.0.

Table 3-11

• Counts associated with specific racial groups, (e.g.,White) do not include Hispanic children.
• Children of unknown race are not included in this analysis.
• Rates were computed by dividing the victim count by the population count and multiplying by 1,000.

Table 3-12

• The category of multiple maltreatment types includes children who were the victims of any two or more types of maltreatment.

Table 3-13

• States that categorize more than 90 percent of data as unknown or missing were not included in this analysis.

Table 3-14

• Each victim is counted only once for each applicable disability category regardless of how many reports the child had. The column total victims with one or more disabilities counts each child only once regardless of how many disabilities were reported.

Table 3-15

• Logistic regression models associate the contribution of the categories within a factor to the outcome of interest (in this case victimization). Odds ratios indicate the likelihood, relative to a selected reference group, of the outcome occurring. Odds ratios greater than 1.00 indicate an increased likelihood of occurrence (e.g., victims of prior abuse or neglect are 43 percent more likely to be victims of maltreatment than children with no history of prior abuse or neglect). Odds ratios less than 1.00 indicate a decreased likelihood of occurrence (e.g., children who are age 16 or older are 57 percent less likely to be victims than children who are younger than 1 year). The reference group is determined by the data analyst and always has a value of 1.00.
• The category of neglect includes medical neglect.
• Asterisks indicate statistical significance.

Table 3-16

• Reports within 24 hours of the initial report are not counted as recurrence. However, recurrence rates may be influenced by reports alleging the same maltreatment from additional sources if the State information system counts these as separate reports.
• The national average percent was taken from the national Child and Family Services Reviews and is not a calculation from the data in the table.

Table 3-17

• Proportional hazard models associate the contribution of the categories within a factor to the distribution of elapsed time to the event of interest (in this case recurrence). Risk ratios indicate the likelihood, relative to the reference group, of the outcome occurring. Risk ratios greater than 1.00 indicate an increased likelihood of occurrence (e.g., victims of prior abuse or neglect are 96 percent more likely to be victims of maltreatment than children with no history of prior abuse or neglect). Risk ratios less than 1.00 indicate a decreased likelihood of recurrence (e.g., victims who are age 16 or older are 51 percent less likely than children younger than 1 year to suffer recurrence). The reference group is determined by the data analyst and always has a value of 1.00.
• The category of neglect includes medical neglect.
• Asterisks indicate statistical significance.

Table 3-18

• The categories "mother and other" and "father and other" include victims with one perpetrator identified as a mother or father and a second perpetrator identified as a nonparent.
• The category of "other" can include more than one person.
• The category of nonparental perpetrator is defined as a perpetrator who was not identified as a parent and includes other relative, foster parent, and residential facility staff, foster care staff, and legal guardian.
• States are included in this analysis only if they can link more than 74 percent of substantiated victims to perpetrators, report perpetrator relationship for more than 74 percent of perpetrators, and report data for multiple perpetrators per report.

Table 3-19

• States are included in this analysis only if they can link more than 74 percent of substantiated victims to perpetrators and report perpetrator relationship for more than 74 percent of perpetrators.

Table 3-20

• States that did not provide perpetrator relationship data for at least 79 percent of perpetrators were excluded from this analysis.

Chapter 3: Figures and Tables

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Footnotes

¹ This chapter is primarily about child victims, but includes some information about nonvictims and, therefore, is titled "Children." back
² Supporting data are provided in table 3-1, which is located at the end of this chapter. The child disposition rate was computed by dividing the total count of children who were the subjects of an investigation (3,511,590) by the child population for the 51 States that reported these data (73,393,682) and multiplying by 1,000. A national estimate of 3,573,000 (rounded to 3.6 million) children who were the subjects of an investigation was calculated by multiplying the child investigation rate (47.8) by the national child population for all 52 States (74,754,213) and dividing by 1,000. back
³ See table 3-2. back
⁴ See table 3-3. The victimization rate was computed by dividing the number of total victims (885,245) by the child population for the 51 States that reported these data (73,393,682) and multiplying by 1,000. A national estimate of 905,000 child victims was calculated by multiplying the victimization rate by the national population (74,754,213), dividing by 1,000, and rounding to the nearest 1,000. back
⁵ See table 3-4. back
⁶ See table 3-5. back
⁷ See table 3-6. back
⁸ See table 3-7. back
⁹ See table 3-8. back
¹⁰ See table 3-9. back
¹¹ See table 3-10. Children may have been the victims of more than one type of maltreatment. back
¹² See table 3-11. back
¹³ See table 3-12. back
¹⁴ See table 3-14. back
¹⁵ See table 3-15. back
¹⁶ The Data Measures, Data Composites, and National Standards to be Used in the Child and Family Services Reviews, 71 Fed. Reg. 109, 32973 (June 7, 2006). back
¹⁷ See table 3-16. back
¹⁸ See table 3-17. back
¹⁹ See table 3-18. back
²⁰ See table 3-19. back
²¹ See footnote 16. back
²² See table 3-20. back

 

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