The Effects of Witnessing Domestic Violence on Children's Development: A Qualitative Revie, Thesis of Management Accounting

Download The Effects of Witnessing Domestic Violence on Children's Development: A Qualitative Revie and more Thesis Management Accounting in PDF only on Docsity! 1 SOCW 6301 Quantitative Article Review and Critique Master of Social Work, Walden University COURSE SOCW 6301: Social Work Practice Research I Qualitative Review and Critique Domestic Violence can be defined as abuse or aggression that occurs in a romantic relationship; domestic violence is a public health crisis that not only impacts the victim/survivor (CDC, 2020) ; but also the children who are exposed to such violence. This qualitative study reviews the effects witnessing domestic violence may have on a child’s emotional, behavioral, social, and cognitive development. Domestic Violence and Children’s Adjustment The title of this qualitative study does not adequately describe the nature of the study; as the title is very vague and only states, children’s “adjustment”. Adjustment can be perceived as various situations; as adjustment could be perceived as how children acclimate to domestic violence; it could be perceived as how children adapt to domestic violence. When reading more into the article, it became apparent that “adjustment” is more related to an adjustment disorder, which can be a reaction to a stressful event in youth (The John Hopkins University, 2020); in this case, the stressful event correlates with the exposure to domestic violence. The title grabbed my attention as I was looking for information that pertained to children and the impact of exposure to domestic violence. Abstract In accordance to Yegidis, et. al, (2018) “the abstract summarizes the research study; it should be noted that the summary will be read more times than the actual article and should be 2 no longer than 150 to 250 words”. While abstracts should be summarized into 150 to 250 words, it may be difficult to encompass such depending upon the issue being researched, the amount of participants, the methods used for research, the outcome measures and the results of the overall study. This research study’s abstract is comprised of the following: Purpose of Research (Identified issue) This qualitative research study seeks to identify if there are any behavioral, emotional, cognitive and/or physical impacts on children who witness domestic violence. Participants and research methods The research study outlines 47 empirical articles that have been published over a twenty- year time frame and examine the experiences of children who have been impacted by domestic violence. The study only identified articles that acquired data by interviewing parents, care givers or teachers of infants, adolescents, and young adults. Results Children exposed to domestic violence generally have more symptoms of children diagnosed with adjustment disorders (emotional and behavioral difficulties) these children also lack social, emotional or mental capability and have more health concerns that children who have not been exposed to domestic violence (Onyskiw, 2003). Only children who were exposed to conflict combined with physical violence were selected to be in the study. apart of the research study. Introduction Domestic Violence is a public health issue that not only impacts the victim/survivor but also children who are exposed to such. This study was conducted as to conceptualize the phenomena between domestic violence and children adjustment. As it was unclear as to how 5 Purposeful sampling was used to obtain an unbiased understanding of the effects of domestic violence and children adjustment. Homogeneous sampling allowed for the selection of over 5,420 children comprised into 47 case study, of which all the children have been impacted by conflict with the inclusion of physical abuse of a parent; this is of particular interest to the researchers (Yegidis, et. al, 2018). The youth selected were residents at domestic violence shelters, youth who were referred to clinicians due to intimate partner violence in the home and survey scale results that indicated domestic violence exposure to youth as completed by mothers. This sample is not random as all the participants were readily available in all 47 studies (Yegidis, 2018). The individuals who were a part of the study, were all participants of the programs, shelters and clinical programs identified in the research study. All the studies that included utilizing a tool to rate children behavior utilized 1 of 6 different checklists; however, the most frequently used checklist used in this study was the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL; Achenbach & Edelbrock, 1978). Most of the studies that utilized self-reporting measures with pre-existing information on reliability and validity; the Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS; Straus et al., 1980) which is a standardized measure to assess violence between intimate partners. The CTS has norms derived from national prevalence studies of violence in American families. Another test utilized for self-reporting measures was the O’Leary-Porter Scale (OPS; Porter&O’Leary, 1980), a scale which assesses the frequency of child exposure to interparental conflict including physical aggression. Sample The nonprobability sample is most effective in this research study; as the focus of the study is to identify the impact emotionally, behaviorally, and physically on youth who have been 6 exposed to domestic violence. It would not benefit to create a random selection of children; as only those who have experienced exposure to domestic violence would represent the population studied (Yegidis, et.al, 2018). Youth who were not exposed to domestic violence were excluded from the study as they would be unable to contribute input into the research question. More specifically convenience sampling was used to determine the participants of the research. The sample size of the research study was 47 studies to include 5, 420 children between the ages of 2 and 18 years of age (Onyskiw, 2003). The youth selected were residents at domestic violence shelters, youth who were referred to clinicians due to intimate partner violence in the home and survey scale results that indicated domestic violence exposure to youth as completed by mothers. This sample is not random as all the participants were readily available in all 47 studies (Yegidis, 2018). The individuals who were a part of the study, were all participants of the programs, shelters and clinical programs identified in the research study. The children selected for the study ranged in age from 2 to 18 years; overall, there were slightly more boys and Caucasian children were overrepresented. There were also children of African American, Hispanic, Asian, Native American, and children of mixed racial origin. In addition, most of the children studied reported they were predominantly from low income families or families classified as lower socioeconomic status, the next percentage of children were from low to middle income families and the lowest percentage were predominantly from middle income or middle-class families. There are no ethical concerns in terms of the children selected; as their parents participated and although does not state that they gave informed consent, it appears that they voluntarily participated. Result 7 The purpose of this study was to determine the effects witnessing domestic violence may have on a child’s emotional, behavioral, social, cognitive, and physical development. Behavioral 46 of the 47 studies examined the impact of domestic violence on a child’s behavioral development (Onyskiw, 2003). The study found that children exposed had more externalizing behavioral concerns, which included aggression, noncompliance, disruption, and anti-social behaviors in relation to nonviolent homes. Mental Health 43 of 47 studies examined the impact of witnessing violence on children’s mental capacity to show that children exposed to domestic violence are more anxious, sad, worried, fearful, and withdrawn that children not exposed to domestic violence in non-violent homes (Onyskiw, 2003). In addition, children were shown to have lower self esteem and depressive symptoms and related suicidal attempts and ideation. Social and Cognitive Competence 50% of the studies examined that children raised in violent homes had difficulty in several areas of social interaction to include higher levels of frustration, more difficulty regulating their emotions when interacting with others. They lacked effective problem-solving skills and conflict resolution strategies, often misinterpreting ambiguous interpersonal situations as potentially threatening and attributing hostile intent to the other person; their responses are also typically more aggressive than others and they have fewer interests in social activities. 11 of the 47 studies assessed the cognitive functioning of children exposed to domestic violence gave an indication of cognitive delays and lower developmental skills; this is especially higher in preschool children who have shown significant developmental delays. In addition,