Childhood trajectories in the aftermath of a child welfare investigation of children exposed to violence

Abstract

Previous research indicates that child welfare services reach out to children exposed to violence unequally depending on the child’s social background, living conditions and violence type, and that once children are investigated by the child welfare services, inequalities in access to interventions prevail (e.g. Kalin et al. 2022; Knezevic 2021; Persdotter & Andersson 2020; Quarles van Ufford et al. 2022). There is a lack of systematic knowledge about the long term outcomes for children investigated by the child welfare services. The current study explores different childhood trajectories in the aftermath of a child welfare investigation initiated due to children’s exposure to violence. A register was set up including all children (n= 1 764) between 7-12 years that were investigated by child welfare services in Stockholm in 2019 for suspected exposure to violence. As a baseline this cohort was systematically compared to demographic data and a national self-report prevalence study to explore possible biases regarding which children the child welfare services investigates (Kassman et al. 2023). In the current paper, the study group development in the first three years following upon the child welfare investigation was explored as regards living conditions, out of home care, health care consumption and school grades. The development of the study group was also systematically compared to a comparison group of children (n=5 000). Descriptive analysis, cluster analysis and logistic regressions were used.