Professionals’ decision-making about out-of-home placements following instances of child abuse

Objective: The goal of this research was to study how different groups of child welfare professionals prioritize and use information to make placement decisions following instances of child abuse. Method: A total of 90 juvenile court judges and guardians ad litem, Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA), social workers, and mental health professionals responded to a detailed questionnaire describing four case studies of child physical abuse in which a parent was the perpetrator, the child was either 2 years or 6 years of age, and the abuse was either first time or chronic. Participants rated the impact of specific pieces of information regarding child, family, and system-level characteristics on their decision-making process. Results: Analyses of reactions to these vignettes demonstrate that professional groups use different kinds of information when making decisions about foster care placements. Social workers and mental health providers rely on information about the severity and pattern of abuse and on information about services offered in the past and parental responses to those services. Judges and guardians ad litem rely more heavily on information about the likelihood of a reoccurrence of abuse and the child’s ability to recount the abuse, whereas CASA volunteers rely on information about the stability of the family. Conclusions: Professional group membership, rather than factors such as age or ethnicity of the child or chronicity of abuse, accounts for different patterns of prioritizing and using information when making decisions about whether a child should remain in the home or be placed in foster care. The implications for community-based training and intervention efforts are discussed. Objectif: Étudier comment divers groupes d’intervenants du domaine du bien-être de l’enfance établissent leurs priorités et utilisent les informations acquises pour déecider du type de placement d’enfants maltraités. Méthode: On a demandé à 90 intervenants (juges de la cour juvénile, gardiens ad litem, défenseurs des droits de l’enfant nommés par la cour, travailleurs sociaux et intervenants en santé mentale) de répondre à un questionnaire qui décrivait quatre études de cas d’enfants maltraités par le parent. Ces enfants avaient de deux à six ans et les mauvais traitements étaient chroniques ou une première agression. Les intervenants ont coté les conséquences de ces informations, lesquelles portaient sur les enfants, la famille et le système, sur le processus de