Abstract
This article is an invited commentary and analysis of the authors’ completed systematic evaluation of Child Protective Services (CPS) differential response (DR) models. I write this commentary based on 25 years of public child welfare experience followed by 13 years as a social work professor and researcher. In their review of DR, the authors’ identify critical and unresolved issues in DR implementation and program evaluation as well as recommendation to improve DR within CPS. In the course of the authors’ evaluation, they completed interviews with key informants in states that have implemented DR; an important contribution to CPS literature. Concepts, issues, and controversies in the DR literature are discussed in view of CPS practice models and history of policy making.
The widespread recognition of need for and provision of Child Protective Services (CPS) began in New York with the 1884 Mary Ellen Wilson case. Each state established child welfare systems with services delivered through county offices. However, it was not until the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA) of 1974 that federal legislation systematically addressed and modestly funded CPS. The legislation set up the National Center on Child Abuse and Neglect and required states to establish systems responding to reports of child maltreatment. The primary responsibility to fund and develop programs was left to states and counties resulting in multiple and wide ranging CPS models and practices. The CAPTA was passed on the knowledge that doctors were identifying serious nonaccidental injuries and child fatalities for which there were a few children for whom protection was needed. However, the extent of the problem was vastly underestimated and states were soon inundated with reports which led states to narrowly define child maltreatment and hired vast numbers of untrained employees with nonsocial work degrees (Ellett & Leighinger, 2007). Without federal guidance on response models, states initially responded to child abuse and neglect (CAN) reports with CPS workers making unannounced home visits focused on safety as standardized protocols did not exist. If caseworkers did not substantiate child maltreatment or risk of CAN, workers had the latitude to either close or leave cases open. These varied practices left states open to criticism.
In response, many states implemented law enforcement allegation-based models in the 1980s which instituted investigation protocols that families perceived as accusatory and invasive. The 1980 Adoption Subsidy and Child Welfare Act provided oversight of public child welfare agency actions to juvenile courts and further increased court involvement through the 1997 Adoption and Safe Families Act. While juvenile courts were originally created in the early 1900s to be nonadversarial with the purpose of rehabilitation in delinquency and child dependency (CPS) cases, they have become increasingly legalistic and adversarial environments. Because the majority (60.5%) of CPS employees do not hold social work degrees (Barth, Lloyd, Christ, Chapman, & Dickinson, 2008), some CPS practices may emanate from employee’s personal beliefs rather than professional social work practice and values. In addition, some legal system practices and values run counter to those in the helping professions. The allegation model increased court involvement, set up adversarial relationships, and made cases against parents, rather than actively engaging family participation in the safety of their children. States also used allegation protocols to insulate themselves from public and media criticism for employee practices in CPS cases (Ellett & Leighninger, 2007). The number of children removed from their homes increased rapidly under allegation models which generated support from state CPS systems, professional groups, and clients for alternative models to support families to safely care for their children.
One such practice model is differential response (DR) the subject this special issue.
According to the authors of the white policy paper,
the current body of research supporting claims of safety and improved outcomes for children is, at best, inconclusive, and at worst, misleading. (Hughes, Rycus, Saunders-Adams, Hughes, & Hughes, 2013, p. 508)
When there are tragic serious injuries and child fatalities, politicians, media, public, and others are quick to malign public CPS employees (Thomlison & Blome, 2012). While, CPS employees know they are providing essential protective services to families preventing further child maltreatment, CPS lacks needed research to refute criticisms of their programs. One methodologically strong approach that could establish the effectiveness of and need for CPS would be to randomize half of all reports to receive CPS services while the other randomized control half would not receive CPS services and to compare the number of maltreated and dead children from the two groups at the end of 6 months or some other period of time. This study is legally and ethically impossible to complete. The most difficult professional decision CPS workers, their supervisors, and managers make, is balancing the rights of parents to raise their children versus the rights of children to safety and permanency (growing up in a family). Hughes et al. (2013) attest that a full investigation is needed in all CPS reports to establish child safety or maltreatment.
Members of the public and particularly politicians want simple answers and a quick and cheap silver bullet solution to CPS. There is no silver bullet and policy makers typically fail to recognize that CPS is a complex practice designed to make complex and often life-altering decisions. A variety of child welfare practices have been intermittently in vogue since child maltreatment was first recognized, vacillating between orphanages, foster care, adoption, friendly visitors, family preservation, independent living, and so on (Ellett & Leighlinger, 2007). What critics of CPS often miss is that all families are unique with differing and ever-changing situations, challenges, and needs. It is unlikely that a single practice model will be effective with all families and CPS needs an array of services and interventions. The case has been made, for example, that practices designed to meet the needs of children and families differ in rural and urban communities (Franke, Bagdasaryan, & Furman, 2011; Zielewski & Macomber, 2007). Consistent with my 25 years of child welfare experiences followed by 13 years as a social work educator and researcher, DR needs to be situated within the context of large scale system change. I agree with these authors who remind us that
success in achieving a service system based on these principles depends largely on agency leadership and commitment, the availability of financial and staffing resources, legislative and policy support, and the skill of administrators in implementing and sustaining complex structural changes to make best practice possible. (p. 505)
The authors do an excellent job of articulating methodological flaws in the extant DR literature in Findings 2 and 3. Collectively, the methodological issues and concerns Hughes et al. (2013) identified and discussed can probably be generalized to most research studies in social work and other social science practice settings. All studies are bounded by variables that cannot be controlled in applied research studies, like many in CPS. Evaluating any practice model in CPS, including DR, is challenging given the host of variables that can affect CPS case outcomes, such as, inadequate CPS funding and staffing, high worker turnover, rapidly changing federal legislation, media portraits of employees, multiproblem families with rapidly changing circumstances, and so on. As a side note, the authors state “In most of the reports we reviewed, there was no discussion of how the instruments, questionnaires, and scales used in the study had been tested to ensure their validity or reliability (p. 500).” This statement implies that reliability and validity are characteristics of the measures. Reliability and validity are ongoing measurement concerns and are sample dependent (American Educational Research Association, American Pyschological Association, & National Council on Measurement in Education, 1999).
From 1912 through the 1950s, the U.S. Children’s Bureau’s recommended credential for child welfare caseworkers was an master of social work (MSW) degree and for supervisors and administrators an MSW plus 2 years of child welfare experience that provided leadership stability and expertise in many state agencies (Thomas, 2012). Once states became overwhelmed with CPS reports in the late 1960s and 1970s, growing numbers of state public child welfare directors were politically appointed, often absent child welfare experience or social work education. I agree with the authors’ point that organizational instability has been a barrier to effective CPS programs. Instability and lack of social work credentials often results in ever-changing CPS directors who are unfamiliar with relevant laws, funding structures, evidence-based practice that perpetuates CPS systems multiple and unevaluated practice models.
I agree with the authors’ Finding #5 that remind us that the adjectives used to describe traditional CPS programs can be described as judgmental, legalistic, intrusive, and threatening to families. They imply that such language creates a negative but unwarranted view of traditional CPS as a means of promoting DR. Hughes et al. (2013) advise CPS professionals to be aware of “inaccurate, unsupported and unfounded promotional claims about DR research reports and the associated program literature” (p. 506). The authors provide readers with multiple examples of language designed to promote the advantages of DR that does not reflect the more objective language of science. They point out the lack of clarity in DR and the need to “negotiate the slippery slope that balances family engagement with child protection. (p. 507)” According to the authors
DR means knowing with reasonable certainty which level of intervention is best for which families, by taking sufficient time at the front end to make the most accurate assessment of both imminent and future risk and by planning interventions best suited for the family’s situation. (p. 508)
In Finding #4, Hughes and colleagues (2013) discuss the paradox that DR models are funded by diverting limited CPS resources from the most serious cases to less serious cases, even those where there has been no maltreatment. CPS employees assigned more functional families in DR have lower caseloads allowing them time to become more deeply engaged with families than those working in more traditional response practices. Caseload issues alone may explain why CPS employees report higher levels of job satisfaction when engaged in DR activities. This observation does raise critical questions in CPS systems about resource allocations and services to children and families. Importantly, the authors remind us that caution is recommended in interpreting what may be unintended biases as a consequence of favoring DR models over traditional response models. CPS workers cannot always determine the seriousness of situations from a reporter’s information. In cases where a child is deemed are at high risk of harm, the case is often assigned to the most experienced or capable workers delivering traditional CPS response.
Even though the benefits of DR for CPS are recognized by the authors, such benefits have not yet been “universally and fully implemented.” The point is well made that though there are definitional and operational issues in developing and implementing DR efforts, few of these efforts have accompanying empirical support for effectiveness. Interestingly, there is little discussion in this article of the importance of a sound theory base for DR that can be used as an impetus for future DR practice models and research.
This document is a rich resource for CPS policy makers, practitioners, social work educators, and evaluation researchers. The critiques of the literature reviewed are quite useful in documenting conceptual and definitional problems with DR practice models and research. Hughes and colleagues (2013) make a vital point that risk assessment is necessary throughout all CPS cases employing family centered social work practice. The higher conceptual questions framing research in CPS are perennial and endemic, for example, what are the means and ends of CPS? Given the variability of CPS among and even within states, if a similarly comprehensive review of the effectiveness of traditional response models was completed in CPS, might researchers reach similar conclusions as these authors reached in examining DR and its effectiveness? This important review of DR efforts in CPS aside, and given the complexity of designing and completing sound evaluation studies in CPS, perhaps the time has come to devise a research-based CPS model that combines the best practice elements of both DR and traditional response as we know them, even though proof of effectiveness is not yet known.
Footnotes
Editor’s Note
This article was reviewed and accepted at the discretion of the Editor.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.