'Rosie 2' A Child Protection Simulation: Perspectives on Neglect and the 'Unconscious At Work'

Neglect is the most common category for abuse of children under one. It is prevalent in large families; where there is a mother with low self‐esteem and frequent changes of partner. Because neglect is difficult to work with, the Centre for Child Protection at the University of Kent has developed a child protection simulation – ‘Rosie 2’ – which is designed to train child protection professionals. It follows a social worker and health visitor on a virtual home visit to a family where neglect is a significant concern, and offers a safe opportunity to explore practice options. A small‐scale research project has been conducted whereby highly sensitive eye tracker technology and facial recognition software were used to examine the emotional responses exhibited by social workers and health visitors during this ‘virtual visit’. The results indicate that the prevailing emotion exhibited by the professional group showed a ‘neutral’ response. There were significant differences between the groups, with health visitors displaying more sadness, and social workers demonstrating greater surprise and disgust. The article discusses these findings in the context of debates on compassion fatigue and emotional response within child protection. We conclude by discussing how the findings can enhance professionals' supervision. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. ‘There were significant differences between the groups’ Key Practitioner Messages Neglect is a chronic problem in some families and can have long‐term effects on practitioners including burnout, compassion fatigue and secondary trauma. Simulations can provide immersive, realistic environments for child protection training and ‘Rosie 2’ has been developed for this purpose. Eye tracker technology coupled with simulations can provide insight into the unconscious emotional impact on practitioners of child protection work. This can potentially support and inform supervision. ‘Simulations can provide immersive, realistic environments for child protection training’