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Child Maltreatment Prevention

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Child and Family Advocacy

Part of the book series: Issues in Clinical Child Psychology ((ICCP))

Abstract

Child maltreatment is a pervasive problem that affects families and communities in the United States and throughout the world. Most credit the “discovery” of child maltreatment to Henry Kempe, a physician from Colorado, who in 1962 published an article in the Journal of the American Medical Association on the “battered child syndrome” (Kempe, Silverman, Steele, Droegemueller, & Silver, 1962). Since the publication of Kempe’s seminal article, progress in the field has been rapid, mobilized by the efforts of many, including grassroots organizations, mental health professionals, university researchers, lawmakers, medical personnel, social service professionals, and criminal justice workers. These efforts have contributed significantly to furthering our understanding of child maltreatment and to the myriad ways that families and professionals can work together to prevent abuse and neglect. This chapter provides a brief overview of the problem of child maltreatment and describes successful research-based prevention strategies. The chapter also describes specific advocacy efforts and action steps and outcomes that should provide a critical component to alleviating the problem of child maltreatment.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Social Science Division, Pepperdine University, Malibu, CA, USA

    Cindy L. Miller-Perrin Ph.D.

  2. Department of Public Health Sciences, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, Charlotte, NC, USA

    Sharon G. Portwood J.D., Ph.D.

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  1. Cindy L. Miller-Perrin Ph.D.
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  2. Sharon G. Portwood J.D., Ph.D.
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Correspondence to Cindy L. Miller-Perrin Ph.D. .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. , Dept. Child, Family, and Community, University of Central Florida, Orlando, 32816, Florida, USA

    Anne McDonald Culp

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Miller-Perrin, C.L., Portwood, S.G. (2013). Child Maltreatment Prevention. In: Culp, A. (eds) Child and Family Advocacy. Issues in Clinical Child Psychology. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-7456-2_5

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