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In this modern age of irresponsibility, many children suffer hours, days, weeks, and even months of pain caused by abuse from parents or other authority figures. Children that suffer abuse are scarred both physically and mentally. They suffer severe long and short-term effects of physical abuse. Because of this, something must be done to prevent physical abuse from happening, or to prosecute those that do abuse their children. Childhood Physical Abuse Florida Statutes Relating to Children First, I will examine Florida Statutes relating to child abuse. After reading chapter 39 of Florida Statutes I have discovered the following terms.
Chapter 39. 01 (2) Abuse means any willful act or threatened act that results in any physical, mental, or sexual injury or harm that causes or is likely to cause the child's physical, mental, or emotional health to be significantly impaired. Abuse of a child includes acts or omissions. Corporal discipline of a child by a parent or legal custodian for disciplinary purposes does not in itself constitute abuse when it does not result in harm to the child. Chapter 39. 01 (52) Physical injury means death, permanent or temporary disfigurement, or impairment of any bodily part. Child physical abuse is one of the main reasons for aggressive attitudes that are developed by adolescents, especially by males, who tend to display increased anger, delinquency, and abuse. In many cases, children who have been abused and neglected by their parents, friends, and society are losing their sense of faith in the future.
Systematic beating, emotional attacks, lack of attention, social and academic problems lead towards the loss of the enthusiasm in life and loss of self-esteem. Physically abused children tend to become introverted, to distrust other people and to develop suspicious type of behavior that may result into number of psychological disorders. Distinction between Physical Abuse and Other Conditions that look like Abuse There are four general types of child maltreatment: physical abuse, sexual abuse, psychological (emotional) maltreatment, and neglect. Theories of sexual abuse are further organized into three separate categories for evaluation: the incest taboo, incestuous abuse, and extra familial sexual abuse.
Physical Injury as stated earlier in Florida Statutes belongs to physical abuse. The first approach is to define physical abuse in terms of actual behaviors and outcomes. The second approach defines abuse in terms of the perpetrators intention. The third approach defines abuse with a consideration of cultural norms. The following factors are related to child physical abuse: traumatic experiences of the perpetrator in early childhood, such as being the victim or witness of abuse, abnormal characteristics of the perpetrator, including psychopathology, personality defects, poor impulse control, and substance abuse, affective processes of the perpetrator, including inappropriate or blunt emotions, and negative affect toward the child and poor self-esteem, distorted cognitive processes of the perpetrator, including rationalizations for the abusive behavior, inaccurate beliefs about the child, and inaccurate beliefs concerning child discipline, and reinforcement for the abuse, including being relieved of intra psychic tension and the quieting of the child. The boundaries between active physical abuse and passive abuse in the form of neglect, as well as between normal corporal punishment and real physical abuse, were discussed.
Finally an attempt was made to specify the signs of child abuse, which were identified as follows: physical damage and signs of maltreatment pertaining to the body of the child (bruises, broken bones, undernourishment, sicknesses left untreated, etc. ) Ways to prepare Parents and Caregivers for Specific Expected Behaviors of Childhood Physical Abuse Parental physical abuse leads to the point that a child starts to realize its unworthiness and develops distrust and fear of parents. Children with histories of physical abuse showed smaller reductions in child behavior problems than children with no history of physical abuse. Similarly, parents with histories of physical abuse showed smaller reductions on a measure of psychopathology than parents with no history of physical abuse. (Herschell, McNeil, 2005) Ineffective parenting is the main reason for acquiring deviant and antisocial behavior. Severe physical punishment towards a person in childhood results in a violent behavior of the person in adulthood.
The person is modeling all the actions of his / her parents and when becomes adult is being aggressive towards own child or spouse. Such a transition of violent behavior through the generations does not solve the problem of child physical abuse and therefore, delinquency. An overwhelming amount of evidence shows that the use of alcohol is prevalent in many cases of criminal assaults and rapes. One drawback of these domestic violence studies is that the models are not applicable to child abuse. The models reviewed assume that the victim has a choice to be in the relationship or not. In reality, this choice is not always available, especially for very young or very old dependents.
In addition, such dependents generally have little or no income to transfer as a means of avoiding violence. Finally, there are other factors involved in the propensity to commit violence. As previously discussed, alcohol in particular plays a major role and should not be left out of any model dealing with domestic violence. Children who experience physical abuse often suffer numerous negative short- and long-term difficulties in comparison to non-abused children. (Herschell, McNeil, 2005) If the parents are considered to be guilty in child physical abuse, it is necessary to separate them from the child and offer proper psychological treatment. Doctors must not directly accuse such mothers and fathers, but try to explain them that there is no medical cause of any illness of the child and there are no reasons to continue physical abuse practice. Treatments for Victims of Childhood Physical Abuse The extent of child physical abuse has become increasingly recognized as a significant and devastating social problem.
Efforts to understand, treat, and prevent child maltreatment are progressing at many levels. Numerous academic journals routinely publish articles on the subject. In general the child welfare reporting systems tend to perceive different types of child abuse differently. Psychological abuse, well recognized as a category in the child abuse readings, is not distinctly conceptualized as a form of abuse for purposes of reporting. This is also the case for physical abuse as long as it does not become medically diagnosed. Physical abuse is also defined largely by doctors, but the reporting systems recognize it as a distinct problem that demands immediate and specialized treatment.
Child welfare authority is the organization initially informed about cases of physical abuse and in charge of dealing with them. Other authorities get involved more or less indirectly. The police are supposed to be informed in any case of physical abuse when the victim is below the age of 15 years, but in practice this is rarely done. Efforts to improve the detection of child abuse will rely heavily on the functioning of child welfare authorities. At the moment the status of the municipal child welfare authorities has become rather blurred.
This is reflected in the practices of other public agencies, which usually ignore their legal duty to report cases of abuse to child welfare authorities. Moreover, when a child abuse case is uncovered, the child welfare authorities deal with it as a general family / social problem, which is referred to other social service providers for treatment. Professionally, social work practice under the auspices of child welfare authorities does not have any independent status in handling cases of child abuse. The medical profession is relied on for diagnosing physical abuse. Efforts to improve the detection of child physical abuse will rely heavily on the functioning of child welfare authorities. At the moment the status of the municipal child welfare authorities has become rather blurred.
This is reflected in the practices of other public agencies, which usually ignore their legal duty to report cases of abuse to child welfare authorities. Moreover, when a child physical abuse case is uncovered, the child welfare authorities deal with it as a general family / social problem, which is referred to other social service providers for treatment. Exchange / control theory also has important implications for treatment. We should have greater social control over family relations and costs of family violence. Clinicians should stress behavioral responsibility by not accepting rationalizations for abusive behaviors, reject cultural norms that permit violence, help reduce family isolation, and promote more democratically run households. Personal Attitude about Childhood Physical Abuse With child abuse reporting rates increasing significantly, one might expect a concomitant rise in out-of-home placement rates.
I think that the more problems with child physical abuse are uncovered, the more children to be removed from dangerous conditions at home. It is somewhat paradoxical therefore to find a declining rate of out-of-home placements in almost every country, with the notable exception of the United States. Therefore, I think more attention should be given to education of parents. Bibliography: Chapter 39, Florida Statutes and excerpts from the Florida Rules of Juvenile Procedure New Feminist Stories of Child Sexual Abuse: Sexual Scripts and Dangerous Dialogues, Book by Paula Really, Sam Warner; Routledge, 2003 Alcohol Outlets and Child Physical Abuse and Neglect: Applying Routine Activities Theory to the Study of Child Maltreatment, Journal article by Bridget Freisthler, Lorraine T.
Midanik, Paul J. Gruenewald; Journal of Studies on Alcohol, Vol. 65, 2004 Child Discipline and Physical Abuse in Immigrant Latino Families: Reducing Violence and Misunderstandings, Journal article by Lisa Aronson Fontes; Journal of Counseling and Development, Vol. 80, 2002 Theoretical and Empirical Underpinnings of Parent-Child Interaction Therapy with Child Physical Abuse Populations, Journal article by Amy D. Herschell, Cheryl B. Mcneil; Education & Treatment of Children, Vol. 28, 2005
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Research essay sample on Physical Abuse Child Welfare
