Psychological maltreatment: An international challenge to children's safety and well being

Abstract

Background: Child psychological maltreatment (PM), also known as emotional abuse and neglect, mental violence, and emotional maltreatment, is the least recognized and addressed of the four major forms of child maltreatment.

Objectives: This article provides an 1) the history of PM and its relationship to children's rights, 2) an overview of the current state of knowledge, 3) implications of diversity for the topic of PM, 4) an example of a topic-relevant intervention, and 5) a vision for further progress in addressing this form of child maltreatment.

Participants and settings: NA.

Method: Literature review, intervention description of fabricated or induced illness, and expert opinion.

Results: PM is directly implicated in seven of the articles of the Convention. PM is common, reliable definitions of PM exist and need to be applied to practice and public health surveillance, harmfulness has been empirically established but is not fully appreciated, and countries vary dramatically in terms of incidence.

Conclusions: PM is a human rights issue that must be addressed through child protection and promotion of child wellbeing. Adoption of reliable definitions of the different aspects of PM for Child Protective Service practice is a top policy goal. The development of empirically supported curricula on PM for training professionals and parents and culturally sensitive interventions to change social norms on the use of psychologically aggressive disciplinary practices and other forms of PM are critical research needs. Well-validated interventions to support quality parent-child relationships and support families exist and need to be widely adopted. Individual child protective measures should be confined to cases of ongoing serious PM when interventions have failed to reduce harm to the child.

Keywords: Emotional abuse; Emotional neglect; Fabricated or induced illness; General comment 13; Mental cruelty; Mental injury; Psychological maltreatment; UN convention on the rights of the child.