Emotional Abuse

The study of interobserver reliability tested the level of agreement among child welfare workers on the presence or absence of emotional abuse and several other forms of neglect and child abuse. Contrary to expectations, soaring levels of accurate identification and agreement was attained. Regardless of the high level of interobserver reliability, the validity of the notion is questioned. Training for the sample used in the study is evidently effective.

Interobserver reliability is one of the dominant issues facing child protective service workers. Its importance escalates as the signs of the neglect or abuse become more abstract and less obvious. The main concern of interobserver reliability is if multiple observers concur on the presence or absence of a particular happening. The level of agreement will be overwhelmingly affected by the transparency of the definitions of abuse and neglect and the extent to which staff are trained in their application. At least one other study raised concerns about this issue because it applies to various aspects of child protective services information processing and definition. A national organization has been formed to fight false accusations called “VOCAL” (Victims of Child Abuse Laws).

In the early phases of the child protective services movement, physical abuse was their main concern. Decades later other types of abuse with unclear indicators have come to prominence, such as emotional abuse and neglect. Emotional abuse and neglect are abstract concepts and provide the basis for concern as to whether child protective service workers can always identify them with given common information, especially when they are among other forms of abuse and neglect.

There are problems in defining emotional abuse and neglect, just as there are problems in defining any type of child maltreatment. The definition of child maltreatment should include only seriously harmful behaviors and outcomes. Protective policies and systems should be utilized