Burge, Philip. (2007). The Ontario crown wards survey: Profiles of adoptable children. Canadian Social Work, 9(1), 8-25.
This paper reports on the incidence of mental and physical disorders in children in Ontario who are permanent wards and legally free for adoption. It explores the incidence of disabilities in crown wards in relation to their experiences of maltreatment and permanency planning, family history, in-care experiences, and residential settings. Information on 429 children, representing about 21% of all eligible wards, is reviewed and analyzed.
Results showed that 56.9% of the children were male, 86.7% were without access, and 57.8% had a disabling condition. The number of disabilities found among children ranged from 1 to 8. In total, 39% of children had one disability, 31% had two, 13% had three and the remainder had more. The most frequent disability was ADHD (20.5%), followed by speech and language disorders or delays (11%). For children attending school and over age 5, 42.2% had an Individual Education Plan.
Dufour, S., Lavergne, C., Larrivée, M.-C., & Trocmé, N. (2008). Who are these parents involved in child neglect? A differential analysis by parent gender and family structure. Children and Youth Services Review, 30(2), pp. 141-156.
Although child neglect is one of the most common forms of maltreatment and continues to increase in Canada, it is one of the least studied. In particular, little is known about the situation of fathers in neglectful families. This study looked at data from 1266 neglecting families, gathered by the Canadian Incidence Study of Reported Child Abuse and Neglect- 2003. It aimed to 1) describe the different family structures characteristic of neglectful families in order to distinguish the place of mothers and fathers; 2) compare the socio-demographic characteristics and personal problems between fathers and mothers (intergender differences), and 3) compare socio-demographic characteristics and personal problems between fathers and between mothers (intragender differences).
Results showed that mothers are proportionately more likely to be grappling with various personal problems than are fathers, although fathers are more likely than mothers to be involved with criminal activity. Single-parent families headed by women have to cope with more severe situations, whereas intact families are, on the whole, better off. Fathers of intact neglectful families are less likely to have problems with alcohol and substance abuse than other family types, and single-parent fathers in neglectful families have a greater likelihood of being unemployed, but otherwise there were few differences among fathers of different family structures. Among mothers of families with different structures, however, there were many differences, with mothers who are heads of single-parent families having the worst situations. Results showed that men are very often present in the lives of neglectful families, and fathers and mothers are often grappling with different personal problems. Overall, the women had more problems than the men.
Temcheff, C., Serbin, L., Martin-Storey, A., Stack, D., Hodgins, S., et. al. (2008). Continuity and Pathways from Aggression in Childhood to Family Violence in Adulthood: A 30-year Longitudinal Study. Journal of Family Violence, 23(4), 231 - 242.
A growing body of research suggests that early patterns of aggressive behaviour and conduct disorder are predictive of later violent behaviour, including domestic violence and child maltreatment. This study used Structural Equation Modeling to test the hypothesis that maladaptive behaviour patterns in childhood may influence the later life functioning of individuals through a variety of pathways. Data were taken from the Concordia Longitudinal Risk Project, which began in 1976 with 1,770 francophone children from a lower socioeconomic area in Montreal, Quebec. The sample used in this study was made up of all ongoing participants who had become parents and were living with at least one of their children at the time of the most recent data collection, and who had completed the Conflict Tactics Scale questionnaire. Participants in the parental violence sample (N=357, n=249 mothers and n=108 fathers) had a mean age of 34.10 years and a mean of 12.2 years of schooling.
Results showed that for fathers, childhood aggression directly predicted violence towards children. For mothers, childhood aggression predicted violence towards children indirectly, through the effects of decreased educational attainment and parenting in the context of parental absence. Direct paths were found from childhood aggression to spousal violence for both fathers and mothers. In summary, for both men and women, childhood aggression may be an identifiable precursor of family violence and child abuse.