Children Exposed to Child Maltreatment and Intimate Partner Violence: A Study of Co-Occurrence Among Hong Kong Chinese Families

• NCJ Number: 236151
• Journal: Child Abuse & Neglect Volume: 35 Issue: 7 Dated: July 2011 Pages: 532-542
• Author(s): Ko Ling Chan
• Date Published: July 2011
• Length: 11 pages
• Publication Format: Article
• Publication Type: Report (Study/Research)
• Language: English
• Country: United Kingdom

Annotation

This study of Hong Kong Chinese families assessed the co-occurrence of child maltreatment and intimate partner violence (IPV) and examined the association between them.

Abstract

Multivariate logistic regression analyses revealed that children exposed to IPV were at higher risk of being victims of neglect, corporal punishment, and physical maltreatment or severe physical maltreatment by their parents than children who were not exposed to IPV, even when controlling for child and parent demographic factors. Results show that 26 percent of the children had been exposed to IPV over the child's lifetime, and 14.6 percent had been exposed to IPV physical assault in the past year; 44.4 percent had been subjected to a parent's corporal punishment or physical maltreatment in their lifetime; 22.6 percent had been subjected to corporal punishment or to physical maltreatment from a parent in the year preceding the study. Among those families in which IPV occurred, 54.4 percent and 46.5 percent were involved in child physical maltreatment over the child's lifetime and in the preceding year, respectively. The higher risk for child physical maltreatment associated with IPV highlights the need for an integrated assessment that screens for the presence of multiple forms of family violence within a family, as well as for an assessment of the effectiveness of responses to both IPV and child maltreatment by child protective service workers and domestic-violence agencies. This cross-sectional study recruited a population-based sample of 1,094 children ages 12-17 in Hong Kong. Structured questionnaires were used to collect data from the children. The prevalence of occurrence of child abuse and neglect by parents and exposure to IPV in both the past year and lifetime were examined, and their correlates were assessed using univariate and multivariate logistic regression. 5 tables and 72 references