Parent Social Attractiveness, Parent Sex, Child Temperament, and Socioeconomic Status as Predictors of Tendency to Report Child Abuse

Abstract

Previous research has shown that the reporting rates for suspected child abuse differ significantly among socioeconomic, demographic, and temperament groups of both perpetrators and victims. The present investigation was designed to manipulate four characteristics of families as independent variables (parent sex, parent social attractiveness, child temperament, and socioeconomic status) in an effort to differentiate the influence of these factors on tendency to report a situation as one of suspected child abuse. Thus, there were 16 experimental conditions, each represented by a different written scenario of an incident in which a 4-year-old boy was brought to an emergency room after he reportedly fell down the stairs while home alone with the identified parent. Participants in the study were 630 undergraduate psychology students who were asked to read one of the 16 summaries and to rate the following factors: likability of the parent, likability of the child, and likelihood that participants would report the case as one of suspected child abuse. Results showed that subjects rated the socially unattractive parent as significantly more likely to be involved in an abusive situation than the socially attractive parent. Subjects were more likely to report a case of suspected child abuse involving the mother than the father. Finally, the condition involving the “easy” child and the attractive father was significantly less likely to be reported than any other condition. The present study seems to emphasize that circumstances other than the facts of the case influence judgments about abuse. Thus, reporting statistics must be interpreted with caution when used as guidelines for identifying high-risk groups. Furthermore, on the basis of the social characteristics, some groups of perpetrators and victims of child abuse may be at risk for false-negative evaluations.