Parents of Abused and Neglected Children: Assessing Engagement and Change

When social workers work with children who have been or are likely to be abused or neglected, their first duty is to try to ensure the safety of the child. In many situations, such children can remain with their parents or main carers, so long as the necessary support can be provided to prevent further abuse or neglect from occurring. Where this is not possible, the removal of children into the care system is often the only remaining option. Crucial to maintaining a child successfully at home is the engagement of the parents with the necessary services, and the ability of those parents to make changes in their parenting behaviour. Unfortunately, the difficulties of assessing and understanding parents' engagement and capacities to change are significant. Instances are relatively common of social workers being over-optimistic about parents' abilities, or of misinterpreting willingness or friendliness towards professionals for a genuine ability to change their behaviour. Shortcomings of this kind have occurred in significant numbers of cases involving child deaths from abuse or neglect, the well-know case in the UK of 'Baby Peter' being a notable example.

The principal investigator of the proposed project (Dr Platt) has extensive experience in both practice and research in relation to engaging parents with services, and working to change and enhance their parenting behaviour. Most recently, he has published a model that seeks to explain what leads to good engagement of parents with the necessary service interventions. This model will be used as the cornerstone for the project, which will involve developing methods and materials to help social workers assess, more accurately, parental engagement and capacity to change. The project will also draw on other relevant work, both at the University of Bristol, and (internationally) in social work and related disciplines.

At the centre of this project will be a consultation with partner organisations to develop methods and materials that will be usable in the pressurised context of social work practice. Three organisations have agreed to work with the University of Bristol, all of which are local authority children's services departments in the South West of England. They have agreed to commit staff time to the collaborative development of these materials, working with a small team from the university, comprising the principal investigator, and a research associate who will be a social worker with relevant practice experience. Following an initial design phase, groups of staff in each partner agency will be given training in using the new methods, followed by a period during which consultancy will be provided to support the use of those materials in practice.

Towards the end of the project, which has a proposed duration of 12 months, there will be an evaluation of the usefulness, applicability and success of the methods and materials that will have been developed. Following evaluation, the materials will be revised as necessary, and disseminated more widely. Dissemination will be through publication in suitably accessible formats, by offering training on a fee-paid basis to organisations who may request it, and through the usual academic outlets. Further evaluation of the impact of use of the materials on outcomes for children over a longer time frame would be beyond the scope of the project, but, depending on findings, a future funding bid from a suitable funder would be considered.

As shown in the Case for Support, problems have been identified in the way social work practitioners understand parents' engagement with services and their capacity to change their behaviour, in families where there are significant concerns about the welfare of the children. The present proposal is intended to help address these difficulties by developing practice methods and materials for assessing these features, and in doing so to contribute to the following outcomes:
i) Application of the assessment methods will lead to improved decision-making regarding interventions for children subject to child welfare concerns.
ii) Application of the assessment methods will lead to improved understanding of parental engagement and capacity to change by participating social workers, and improved skills in assessing these.
iii) The methods of assessment of parental engagement and capacity to change will be usable and valued in the social work practice context.

Strategies for achieving these impacts have been included as a fundamental part of the design of this project, in the sense that the work will involve collaboration with practitioners to bring an existing body of (international and interdisciplinary) research and theory into the practice arena in a manner that is relevant and accessible. Within the lifetime of the project, it is intended that the achievement of the above outcomes will be demonstrated through the work of social work practitioners in partner organisations who participate in the project.

Beyond the lifetime of the project, the materials designed as part of the project will be revised on the basis of the year's experience, and will be disseminated widely to practitioners across the UK. The PI has links with a relevant training agency, and with the organisation Research in Practice (a subscription-based organisation working with a network of local authorities and social work organisations), and these and other relevant options will be examined with a few to making the materials available to local authorities and other relevant organisations.

With regard to impact within the research community, in addition to the above activities the following will be undertaken:
i) At the end of the project, the intention is that the revised practice materials will be ready for regular use by the partner authorities, and would be usable by other social work organisations. Application in this way would enable us to seek funding from an appropriate funding body for research activities exploring a) the potential to widen the applicability of the materials, for example in the context of greater ethnic diversity; and b) to evaluate the impact not only on practitioners, but also on outcomes for children and families over a longer time period.
ii) In addition to the funder's normal reporting requirements, the results of the project would be written up for publication in academic journals. A minimum of two such papers are anticipated, and the target date for submission will be 30th April and 30th Sept 2015.