NCJ Number
213689
Journal
Child Abuse & Neglect Volume: 30 Issue: 3 Dated: March 2006 Pages: 283-306
Date Published
March 2006
Length
24 pages
Annotation
This study explored the effects on Israeli children of experiencing different forms of family violence at different developmental stages.
Abstract
The findings are mixed regarding the effects of family violence on children and adolescents. The various informants (mothers, fathers, target children, and homeroom teachers) did not agree about which groups of children were most severely affected by family violence and there was little stability in the pattern of reported effects over time. Children were more likely than other informants to report a pattern of maladjustment that varied according to recent or concurrent exposure to family violence. Family violence experienced during middle school seemed to have more of an impact on children’s adjustment than did family violence experienced during adolescence. There was little evidence that family violence experienced early in the life cycle had persistent effects in the absence of continued violence. The results have important implications for the design of research on family violence. In particular, the discrepancies among the informants demonstrate the necessity of including more than one type of informant in social research. Research design involved following a cohort of 110 Israeli children between the ages of 8 and 13 years and their parents; the children were either victims of physical abuse, witnesses of spouse abuse, both victims and witnesses, or neither victims nor witnesses. When children averaged 10.5 years and nearly 16 years, mothers, fathers, children, and homeroom teachers evaluated the children’s adjustment by completing a series of measures including the Child Behavior Checklist, the Teacher Report Form, and the Youth Self-Report. Data analysis techniques included the calculation of Pearson correlations and Repeated Measures ANOVA. Study limitations include its small sample size. Tables, references