Rehabilitation Varies for Child Abusers

In a study of child abusers, a majority of whom were women, USC researchers have found that people who abuse or neglect their children do respond to treatment, but that many need intensive treatment.

Unfortunately, “financial cutbacks have forced many agencies to adopt a minimum treatment approach with child abusers, regardless of the severity of their problems,” said Helen Land, an assistant professor at USC’s School of Social Work who conducted the research.

She studied 89 suspected child abusers, all parents of children under 2; 72% were women, and 62% were white. Most had been identified by the juvenile court system as requiring intensive treatment because of physical abuse or severe neglect of their children.

Land found that these parents had abnormal psychological symptoms. She tested the group with Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory to determine the parents’ levels of psychological distress and found that almost 70% scored in the abnormal range, with most exhibiting psychopathic and hypomanic symptoms. (Psychopathic disorders are characterized by a lack of deep emotional response, an inability to profit from experience and a disregard of social conventions. Symptoms might be lying, stealing, alcohol or drug abuse and sexual acting out. Common hypomanic symptoms are elated, unstable moods, psychomotor excitement, impatience, egocentricity and flights of ideas.)

Then Land reviewed the treatment parents received and any improvements in order to establish whether there was a relationship between intensity of treatment and rehabilitation.

To be judged “improved,” the subjects had to meet criteria that would be familiar to most parents: They had to exhibit an improved ability to see their child as an individual rather than as an extension of themselves, have more reasonable expectations for their child’s age-appropriate behavior and exhibit greater tolerance for the kinds of negative behavior expectable in children. They also had to show increased self-esteem, more realistic self-expectations and a change in life demonstrating less isolation and more ability to turn to others for help.

Land found a significant relationship between the frequency and duration of treatment (a combination of individual, group and family therapy and help in parenting skills) and rehabilitation among the parents.

Of those treated for at least four months, 62% were judged partially improved and 17% improved. Only 24% tested partially improved and 5% of those who went for shorter periods of treatment also improved.

The number of hours of treatment each week was also a factor, Land said in the university report on the study, but even among those who received more than 12 hours a week of treatment, rehabilitation appeared to depend on the number of months they went to therapy.

In her conclusion, Land suggests that cutbacks in programs that treat severely disturbed child abusers are rendering ineffective the treatment that is provided, and leaving a serious problem that by no means ends with the parent and child involved.

“The intergenerational nature of child abuse has been well-documented,” she said. “Intensive treatment is expensive, but for parents who are highly disturbed, it appears to be an effective way to break the cycle of abuse and limit, if not prevent, future tragedies.”