Transcript Child neglect, delinquency and family education

Child neglect, delinquency and family education
Prof. CHAN Yuk-chung
Department of Applied Social Sciences,
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
18.5.2011
Presented at the 2011 International Conference
Crime Prevention and Offenders Rehabilitation – Prospects and Challenges
Organized by The China Prison Association and the The Society of Rehabilitation and Crime Prevention, Hong Kong
Held at the University of Hong Kong between 17-20 May 2011.
Objectives
 To delineate the nature, causes, and consequences of
child neglect
 To identify the relationship between child neglect and
delinquency
 To examine family education as a remedy to both child
neglect and juvenile delinquency
 To explore compulsory family education as an option
in helping neglectful families and those with children
and young people at risk of delinquency
Child Neglect
 a type of maltreatment that refers to the failure by the caretaker to
provide needed, age-appropriate care although financially able to
do so, or offered financial or other means to do so (US –
NCANDS)
 persistent failure to meet a child’s basic physical and/or
psychological needs, likely to result in the serious impairment of
the child’s health or development” (UK –DfES)
 the failure to provide children with the basic necessities of life
(NSW, Australia –DoCS)
 severe or a repeated pattern of lacking of attention to a child’s
basic needs that endangers or impairs the child’s health or
development (HK - Social Welfare Department)
Components of child neglect
 inadequate food
 inadequate clothing
 inadequate shelter
 inadequate supervision
 inadequate medical care
 inadequate emotional care
 inadequate education
 exploitation, and exposure to unwholesome circumstances.
(Rose and Meezan (1993)
Types of child neglect
 Physical neglect
 harm or endangerment resulting from inadequate nutrition, clothing,
hygiene, and supervision
 Emotional neglect
 failure to provide adequate affection and emotional support, and cases of
psychological neglect are commonly marked by parents who are detached
and uninvolved with the children
 Education neglect
 failure to comply with laws requiring school attendance, consistently
permitting truancy without legitimate reasons, as well as an inattention to
special education needs
 Medical neglect
 extraordinary inattention to the child's health care needs, such as failure of
unwarranted delay to bring medical care to a child with health problem
Effects of child neglect on children
 failure of parents to provide for the basic physical and psychological needs of
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the children often leads to impediments in physical growth and even nonorganic
failure to thrive (Drotar, Eckerle, Satola, Pallotta, & Wyatt, 1990).
The inadequacy of early brain development has permanent and irreversible
consequences, leading to problems in physical, cognitive, emotional, and social
domains.
neglect in early life is found to be detrimental to subsequent cognitive
development that continues to handicap children’s academic functioning in later
years (Kendall-Tackett and Eckenrode, 1996).
it hampers the social development of the children. There was a negative
relationship between neglect and children’s social competence (Herrenkohl,
Kerrenkohl, Egolf, and Wu, 1991).
neglected children were found to have more behavioral problems at home and
at school (Wodarski, Kurtz, Gaudin, and Lowing, 1990), and child neglect is a
good predictor of delinquency (Starr, McLean, Keating, 1991).
Child neglect and delinquency
Brain/Cognitive
Under-development
Child
neglect
Academic
Under-development
Low
social competence
Youthful at-risk behaviors
Delinquent behaviors
Family education as an option
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Family education be widely used as an instrument to
promote positive and responsible parenting as a strategy for
preventing child neglect and delinquency in the general
population;
Early identification of parents with difficulties and
strengthening parenting competence at different stages of
the family life cycle through parent/family education
Mandatory/court-ordered parent education should be an
option for parents who have persistently neglected their
children and who have offended laws against child neglect
in HK
Thank you