"When we think of child abuse, we imagine several different forms of harmful parenting and injuries to children. Most are not visible to the naked eye, but can be seen if you look more deeply. X-rays can detect fractures and other imaging can find internal injury and bleeding, but most maltreated children have more long-lasting harm that reveals itself through behavioral and emotional maladjustment, developmental delay, sadness, and other destructive behaviors later in childhood, adolescence and into adulthood. These injuries to their personality, sense of self, relationship to society and mental health change the trajectory of their lives and dim their potential, with social and financial costs for safety, treatment and their lost personal growth. We think of these as affecting everybody's children and that the responsibility lies with everyone to respond. This is why we put together this book: to address prevention from a number of perspectives and a variety of professions. We hope that it successfully brings together a number of disciplines and perspectives to address child abuse and neglect among the world's families, governments and cultures. We hope that those reading these chapters will realize that there are replicable best practices that can be reliably implemented based on child and family experiences and needs rather than single approaches designed to attack single forms of maltreatment, and we look forward to the day that books like these are not needed"--

Child maltreatment occurs in the Black community at higher rates than any other racial group. Given the prevalence of child maltreatment risk factors in the Black community, such as being in a low-income family, single parent family, greater exposure to physical discipline, and less access to services and resources, it is not surprising but nonetheless concerning that Black children are at greater risk for abuse and/or neglect. Unearthing the cause and effect between the challenges faced by the Black community and the life outcomes for Black children is key to making positive changes happen. Through a feminist and womanist lens, the authors unpack the range of factors that intersect and impact the Black community that are necessary to address to effectively protect Black children. Understanding how to prevent maltreatment and promote health and wellness are essential to adequately address maltreatment so as to protect and empower Black children.

This book examines core multicultural concepts (e.g., intersectionality, acculturation, spirituality, oppression) as they relate to child maltreatment in the United States. Specifically, this book examines child maltreatment through the interaction of feminist, multicultural and prevention/wellness promotion lenses. Five case studies, which are introduced early on are revisited to help the readers make important and meaningful connections between theory and practice.

This technical package represents a select group of strategies based on the best available evidence to help prevent child abuse and neglect. These strategies include strengthening economic supports to families; changing social norms to support parents and positive parenting; providing quality care and education early in life; enhancing parenting skills to promote healthy child development; and intervening to lessen harms and prevent future risk. The strategies represented in this package include those with a focus on preventing child abuse and neglect from happening in the first place as well as approaches to lessen the immediate and long-term harms of child abuse and neglect ... This package supports CDC's 'Essentials for Childhood' framework for preventing child abuse and neglect. In particular, it articulates a select set of strategies and specific approaches that can create the context for healthy children and families and prevent child abuse and neglect (Goals 3 and 4 of the framework ..."--Page 7.

Many child abuse prevention programs have targeted factors within the family, such as parenting skills. This book describes the next wave of prevention: the promotion of safer, healthier childrearing environments in entire communities. The contributors are leading authorities who illuminate how contextual factors—including poverty, chaotic neighborhoods, and lack of social supports—combine with family factors to place children at risk for maltreatment. They present a range of exemplary programs designed to strengthen communities while also helping individual parents to meet their children's needs. Real-world evaluation approaches, quality-control strategies, and policy implications are discussed in depth.

Each year, child protective services receive reports of child abuse and neglect involving six million children, and many more go unreported. The long-term human and fiscal consequences of child abuse and neglect are not relegated to the victims themselves-they also impact their families, future relationships, and society. In 1993, the National Research Council (NRC) issued the report, Under-standing Child Abuse and Neglect, which provided an overview of the research on child abuse and neglect. New Directions in Child Abuse and Neglect Research updates the 1993 report and provides new recommendations to respond to this public health challenge. According to this report, while there has been great progress in child abuse and neglect research, a coordinated, national research infrastructure with high-level federal support needs to be established and implemented immediately. New Directions in Child Abuse and Neglect Research recommends an actionable framework to guide and support future child abuse and neglect research. This report calls for a comprehensive, multidisciplinary approach to child abuse and neglect research that examines factors related to both children and adults across physical, mental, and behavioral health domains-including those in child welfare, economic support, criminal justice, education, and health care systems-and assesses the needs of a variety of subpopulations. It should also clarify the causal pathways related to child abuse and neglect and, more importantly, assess efforts to interrupt these pathways. New Directions in Child Abuse and Neglect Research identifies four areas to look to in developing a coordinated research enterprise: a national strategic plan, a national surveillance system, a new generation of researchers, and changes in the federal and state programmatic and policy response.