Please read Chapter 7 OR Ch 19 in the handbook. This is your choice based on your interests, and if applicable to your expert topic.
Summarize the chapter and in your writeup incorporate answers to the following questions:
What most interested you in the chapter? What was most surprising to you? How does the chapter you read relate to family violence (be specific). Are there elements of the chapter that relate to your area of expertise? If so, what are they and how do they further develop your understanding of your topic?
Chapter 19 discusses the affects of child maltreatment on emotional affect, attachment and memory of the child. Having a child that unfortunately has witnessed a lot of aggression and violence at the hands of his biological father, I was very eager to read this chapter in hopes to gain a better understanding of what potential obstacles my son may face down the road so that I could develop strategies to help him overcome them.
To me, child maltreatment is one of the most devastating forms of family violence (and violence in general, for that matter). There is something about the idea of the purity and innocence of the child being annihilated at the hands of the people who the child depends the most on (the parents) that is utterly sickening to me.
During childhood, it is the parents' responsibility to lay down the foundation of what type of adult the child is to become through their parenting-techniques and behavior modeling. If during that time, a child is exposed repeatedly to violence within the family it ultimately primes the child for a lifetime filled with psychopathology and poor psychological functioning. Although not all children are doomed to endure these problems, the chapter points out that family violence does significantly increase the potential for these problems.
The first area discussed in the chapter is about emotional regulation. Maltreated children showed more problems with recognition, expression and understanding of emotions. The chapter cited several studies that concluded to this fact. The findings of the studies showed that abused children were more likely to be aggressive, show more distress, report more fear and exhibit patters of emotion dysregulation in response to witnessing angry interactions between adults. They also found that abused children required less sensory input to accurately identify facial displays of anger and more disturbingly, the children found it more difficult to disengage attention from them.
Not surprisingly, abused children tend to respond aggressively when provoked in everyday peer relations (like in a school setting). This ties into my expert topic because the Positive Behavior and Interventions and Support (PBIS) program was developed to help lessen this type of behavior. With the PBIS program, children learn how to behave in certain settings. Since abused children would not learn culturally-appropriate behavioral expectations at home, they are given the opportunity to develop them within the classroom setting. If a child does not respond to the teachings at a general level, they are given extra support and interventions on a more individual level. At these levels, the child's behavior is given a more in depth look to determine it's function (in other words, why is the child behaving the way that they are?). Once the function of the behavior is identified, the child is taught alternate ways to express their emotions (also known as Functionally Equivalent Replacement Behaviors or FERBs).
Understandably, child maltreatment has a detrimental effect on the child's attachment. If the parent-child relationship is tarnished with violence and aggression, ultimately the child will develop an insecure attachment style. This falls within Erikson's Stages of Psychosocial Development. During the first 18 months of life, children develop a sense of trust when their parents provide reliability, care and affection. When the parents fail to provide those things, the infant develops mistrust. Without trust, the child will not be able to develop a secure attachment style with their parents. Thus they develop an insecure attachment style such as avoidant attachment.
Interestingly enough, the PBIS program can also help parents to develop secure attachments with their children. Through a parent training component of the PBIS program, parents are able to learn about the importance of positive interactions and building positive relationships with their children. These sessions are conducted by the school psychologist and are free of charge. In the first session of the parent training that I attended through Tri-County Head Start, the parents were asked to do an activity in which they were to think of someone who was really special to them while they were growing up. They were then asked why they thought of that person and what they did that made them important or special to them. This activity helped the parents to identify their child's emotional needs for a positive support system/parent-relationship. They referred to this as a child's "relationship tank." They explained that everybody has a "relationship tank" and that it needs to be refilled from time to time. The training explained that parents could refill their children's "tanks" by spending quality time with their children (such as playing games with them, talking to them about their day, taking them somewhere special, reading books with them, etc), expressing their love to them whenever possible, and giving them positive encouragement through praise (which they further gave tips on how to encourage their children such as getting your child's attention, using behavior specific language, avoid combining encouragement with criticism, using enthusiasm, doubling the impact with physical warmth like hugging, and using positive comments and encouragement with your child in front of others). During the training, parents engage in role-playing activities to practice positive parent interactions and are given assignments to do at home which require them to put into practice what they learned at the meetings.
The thing that I found most interesting and surprising about the chapter was how maltreatment could effect a child's memory. As the chapter explained, emotion regulation, attachment, psychopathology, and maltreatment all come together to influence memory processes. Because abused children have difficulty disengaging attention from anger cues, they may have unusually accurate memories of childhood traumas because they focused greater attention on the events.
The chapter also suggested that attachment style may play a role in a child's ability to recall details of their abuse. Children who have insecure avoidant attachment style may not clearly remember the specifics of the abuse because they unconsciously developed a strategy called "defensive exclusion." Defensive exclusion limits the processing of stressful information. This could be a coping strategy a child develops to avoid unpleasant and intrusive specific memories.
For this blog I read Ch. 19 because it is very applicable to the professional work I am currently doing and plan to continue. I majored in Psychology as an undergrad and am currently in the MSW program because of my strong feelings regarding child maltreatment. This chapter outlines the importance of understanding how aggression and violence directed at children can affect their psychological development, attachments and memory. By gaining a better understanding of these effects we can continuously develop more appropriate intervention programs, treatment, prevention programs, etc. This information also has significant implications legally. I believe that this chapter did not cover the legal implications as thoroughly as I wish it would have. I am currently working at the Allen Child Protection Center and one of the basic principles of the program is to reduce the trauma placed on the child following the alleged abuse. In particular the point is to reduce the number of interviews the children have to participate in once abuse is reported. This chapter provided helpful information regarding memory that has important implications for the work I am currently doing. By understanding the effects trauma can have on memory it can provide the professionals involved with greater insight regarding the child's disclosure of abuse. I also believe this chapter provides useful information supporting the use of child protection centers to reduce the trauma, provide the support the child may not otherwise have and create a safe environment for the child.
In the section of the chapter that discussed memory and child maltreatment it identified "defensive exclusion." This term is summarized as "insecure-avoidant children, whose bids for care have been repeatedly rejected or belittled, are theorized to develop a defensive, largely unconscious strategy." The chapter continues by reporting that this strategy limits activation of attachment behavior that might remind a person of prior attachment-related rejections, separations or losses. I found this concept to be very interesting. Although it seems as though it is somewhat common sense, the information can and should be utilized regularly by professionals to gain a better understanding of children who are victims of maltreatment in order to initiate services, policies, etc. that are most appropriate for the victims.
I believe this chapter directly relates to my expert topic of mandatory reporting of child abuse. The information provided in this chapter further supports the need for consistent and precise mandatory reporting laws and regulations. I believe this chapter can also support the need and purpose of mandatory reporting because it gives very precise information regarding the effects of child maltreatment. This information could be utilized to educate individuals regarding the importance of intervention and the possible implications of failing to do so. I will probably utilize some of this information in the chapter as direction for further research and as a resource regarding my topic.
I chose to read chapter 19 on child maltreatment for this assignment. This chapter discusses how a child who is poorly treated at certain ages will be affected in their current and future states regarding mental health, memory, attachment, and evaluation of emotions. Most of this chapter was not surprising at all. It seems very logical that an abused child will have difficulty with analyzing and responding to certain emotions, namely anger, in others. It also seems logical that they will have difficulty in their social interactions and display more violent or aggressive behavior than other children, especially when they are exposed to physical violence. This particular idea supports the idea of modeling in child behavior. Several studies have been done that support the claim that children will often model the behavior of adults around them. When a child is physically abused or is exposed to frequent physical violence, that child is likely to display the same physically violent behavior.
One thing I did find very interesting is the link between child maltreatment and future psychopathology in an individual's life. Many serious mental health disorders are often linked to genetics and other causes. It seems that linking these disorders to childhood experiences and abuse might be taking a step back in the field of psychology. Most of the psychology field has moved away from the psychoanalytic perspective (with an emphasis on childhood experiences). However, it makes sense when discussed in this chapter. Childhood abuse has recently been examined with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Because PTSD is possibly a memory disorder, there are now more studies being done on whether or not childhood abuse memory is involved with the development of future PTSD. I thought this was the most interesting idea in the chapter.
Along with that, the chapter also discussed the effects of child maltreatment on memory. Depending on the type of attachment that an individual has, he or she may have different accuracies of memory with severe events. The textbook does a wonderful job of outlining this. A person who was abused as a child and has more of an avoidant type of attachment to others will have less accuracy in recalling the severe memories of childhood abuse.
Chapter 19 certainly relates to family violence. Children are abused by their parents or caretakers. These caretakers are often (but, not always) other family members. Also, violent or aggressive behaviors displayed by parents or caretakers is visible to children, even if the children are not being abused themselves. Even being exposed to this family violence creates trauma and emotional issues within the child.
This chapter relates to my expert topic of self harm because we are able to link child maltreatment with future mental health issues. Self harm often occurs with these mental health disorders, especially Major Depressive Disorder. If childhood maltreatment is linked to these disorders, than it can also help us better understand the underlying causes of some cases of self harm. As an example, I think back to the episode of Intervention we were assigned to watch about Tamela. Tamela was a young lady who engaged in frequent self harm behavior in the form of cutting her skin. As the episode progressed, viewers learned that Tamela was sexually abused as a child. The topics discussed in chapter 19 help make that connection between Tamela's childhood abuse and trauma and her current state of mental health and self harm behavior.
I read chapter 7; The Transmission of Aggressiveness Across Generations: Biological, Contextual, and Social Learning Processes. This chapter focuses mainly on, as the title suggests, how violent and non-violent behavior can be transferred to younger generations of a family. One study that the authors cited for this article suggests that early aggressiveness in particular may have a lasting effect into adulthood. The chapter also goes on to talk about intergenerational continuity of aggression, genetic influences, and how a child can learn behavior from observing their parents.
One thing that I found to be most interesting in this chapter was when they showed the graph that compared a 48 year old parent to a 30 year old that could be their child. The graphs look almost identical to each other with only a little variation, which indicates that a child is at risk for having the same amount of aggression as their parents, especially the closer they are in age to each other. This indicates that if a child lives in a home where there is a high amount of aggression, then they will be just as likely to be highly aggressive when they get to be older.
Another thing that I found to be incredibly shocking was when the chapter was when they talked about how youth aggression and aggression-promoting parenting have reciprocal effects on each other. For example, the book talks about how aggression in youth often encourages aggression-promoting parenting. In turn, the aggressive-promoting parenting makes the child exhibit more aggressive behavior. To me, this is really scary. It is a vicious cycle that seems to be at risk for escalating if it is continued for too long.
I think this chapter really relates to family violence. Not only does it talk about how children can be at risk for aggressive behavior, but it talks about how aggressiveness can be maintained throughout generations. Especially with the dynamic between youth aggression and aggression-promoting parenting, the aggression can escalate very quickly into violence. Observation, as the book talks about in chapter seven, is also a huge factor in promoting behavior in youth. If a young child sees their parent punch something (or worse, someone...) then that child will think it is okay to do the same thing when they are upset.
This chapter also gives us a better understanding of how aggression is maintained throughout generations, as I have mentioned before. By knowing that aggression is similar between family memebers as well as generations in families, we can identify individuals that could be at risk for developing violent and aggressive behavior later on in life. Not only that, but we can also see and possibly understand why a person acts violently and use that to help them get the help they need if they are a truly violent person.
This chapter most definitely seems to tie in with my expert topic on bullying. I had mentioned before about how I had wanted to include a focus on parental involvement in school bullying and this chapter definitely helped to shed some light on a possible direction I can go with my topic. Children that are bullies do not become bullies on their own. They learn to become bullies by watching how their parents and others interact with the world. What is worse, the child may come from an abusive household. By learning about how aggression is transmitted throughout generations, we can better understand how children become bullies. We can also use this information to develop more effective school programs that allow children to talk to people in a safe environment about their home situation. If we are able to understand where a student comes from, especially a student who bullies, we can get them the help and attention they need and deserve. We can also help make schools a lot more safe for children.
I read chapter 19 regarding the influence of violence and aggression on children's psychological development. In childhood, the majority of children have their needs met and their problems consist of trivial things that as a child seem significant but as adults, we realize the problems will seem silly in a few years. There are immense distinctions between the majority of children and then those who are child victims of early trauma. Some children have have suffered more physical and emotional pain by a young age than I could ever imagine going through in an entire life. This chapter discusses the ways in which violence and aggression leave long-lasting scars on children. It provides research and discussion on how trauma can affect emotional and cognitive development, memory, and attachment of children.
The first part discusses the emotion regulation of children who are abused or traumatized. Child maltreatment can have severe effects on affect regulation,emotional reactivity, difficulty in processing emotions, understanding emotions, and cause hypervigilant emotions. The handbook cites a number of significant studies that have been done to assess these issues maltreated children have with emotional regulation.
The chapter next discusses the attachment of traumatized children. Research has found abused children are more likely to be insecurely attached to the parental figure. The problems with attachment the chid acquires are important because attachment does not merely entail a relationship with only the abusive individual; it carries through in other relationships throughout the child's life. I see this as one of the most detrimental consequences of abuse and aggression because we live in a social world. Without being able to make meaningful and reciprocal relationships, one may feel lonely, isolated, and alienated their whole life.
The next part talked about psychopathological problems that could be a result of child maltreatment. Some disorders mentioned that are of high occurrence in abused children are ADHD, depression, PTSD, and personality disorders. This part of the chapter directly relates to my expert topic in that due to the increased probability of an abused child developing personality disorders, this may lead to more victimization or increased violence by the victim in adulthood. Other disorders mentioned as a result of child abuse were substance abuse, suicidal or self-harm behavior, and oppositional disorder. While reading, I did not know what oppositional disorder was so for anyone else wondering, the DSM defines it as an ongoing pattern of disobedient, hostile and defiant behavior toward authority figures which goes beyond the bounds of normal childhood behavior.
The next section pertains to the memory of an abused child. The memory processes of these children are influenced by the coping methods they employ to deal with the traumatic events. The individual may not remember the events,replace the events with new events, remember the events very vividly and frequently, or the person could even develop PTSD following the trauma.
This chapter directly relates to family violence, especially regarding the attachment of children. Attachment is an important aspect of a child's development. Having such a confusing relationship with one who is your own family, makes it hard to develop any real and positive attachments. This chapter does a great job at explaining the severe consequences family violence can have on a developing child.
I decided to read chapter 19, because the influences violence and aggression have on children has always been an interesting topic to me. It was interesting in how the book mentioned emotion regulation and attachment with child maltreatment. All the topics mentioned actually seem to intertwine with each problem integrated with the other. Aggression was more common in children who were mistreated, but at the same time the same mistreated children seemed to be more fearful of conflicts between adults, along with thinking the situation is more stressful than it actually is. I found that particular passage quite interesting due to its dual nature. Along with the integration, the children who are mistreated often have inappropriate attachments made with their parent(s), which can affect attachments made later in life along with the growth of negative personality characteristics (such as increased aggression).
What most interested in the chapter, however, was the discussion over memory and how trauma from a parent/primary caretaker can influence a child’s memory, even up to adulthood. This also ties in with my previous paragraph about how all the topics mentioned are intertwined, because the affected memory might change how one would interact and create attachments. As mentioned in class with sibling abuse, those who “change” what happened to simple childhood shenanigans might even change the way they make attachments when older. What could have potentially been a disorganized/disoriented attachment, can now possibly become a “normal” and secure attachment.
Something I found somewhat surprising, mainly because it was not mentioned in the book was effect of outside characters and their possible interactions with the mistreated children. Oftentimes, children can become well-adjusted even without the parent’s help, as long there are other well-adjusted adults in the child’s life. I would expect a difference with this normal happening, due to the damaged relationship between the parent and child. It would have been of some interest for it to be mentioned.
This chapter is related to family violence because it involves members of an immediate family and physical/emotional harm is caused to another. In the book, rates of insecurity were as high as 95% within children who were considered to be mistreated. A few sentences later, the mention of increased serious health risks are mentioned. This sort of inadequacy in parenting from the caregivers is harmful, in short-term and long-term views. This chapter shows the egregious harm from emotional abuse, especially as a child.
I chose to read Chapter 19. This chapter discusses the effects trauma and child maltreatment have on a child’s emotional regulation, need for attachment, psychopathology, and memory. By understanding the negative effects child maltreatment can have on a child’s future, we can begin to develop better intervention/prevention programs and other related services. For children, they are born and grow up depending on having their needs met through their social interactions with their family. Families who mistreat their children are failing horribly in ensuring those kids develop appropriate ways to deal with their emotions, recognize and have positive attachments to family members and other people, have uninterrupted psychological development growing up, and having the opportunities to have tons of good memories.
The chapter starts off with discusses the effects of maltreatment on how children regulate their emotions. It’s not surprising to me that children who have been mistreated have difficulties in recognizing, expression, and understanding their feelings and emotions. Having these types of issues early on in life can affect how children recognize, express, and understand their emotions in the future as well. One thing I thought was important to note was that on study found that children who are repeatedly exposed to anger and family violence have greater emotional reactivity to those sorts of behavior. Children who are abused can recognize anger in other peoples’ faces more easily than children who were not abused. One thing that I found interesting that we kind of discussed in class today was the statement “maltreated children had less positive perceptions of their mother.” I think they were talking about a certain study, but I would like clarification if at all possible. Either way it’s an interesting point to make regarding maltreatment of children.
Attachment relationships are also affected when children are mistreated. The authors note that maltreated children are at heightened risk of developing unhealthy attachment relationships with caregivers. This is complex because the attachment itself isn’t completely ‘bad’—the person they love is also the person who is hurting them. It’s difficult for children who are mistreated to understand and recognize the difference between a healthy relationship and an unhealthy relationship. Unhealthy attachments also carry though into other relationships throughout the course of the child’s life.
The next section talks about the effects of child maltreatment on a child’s psychopathology. The book notes that psychological developmental issues during the early years of a child’s life can contribute to future issues later on. For example, maltreated children have an increased risk of developing depression later on in life. The book lists several disorders within this section including PTSD, depression, conduct disorders, ADHD, PTSD, etc.
The last section discusses the effects of child maltreatment on a child’s memory. The memory processes of maltreated children are influenced by the coping methods they use to deal with the trauma and abuse in their lives. Coping strategies may include the following: blocking out memories, minimization of events, rewriting the event, and retelling the event multiple times. These coping strategies can have numerous negative effects down the road (e.g. blaming themselves, issues in school, issues with developing relationships with others).
This chapter relates to family violence because it involves violence against children by someone within their immediate family causing physical and/or emotional harm to the child. Parents who abuse their children are not only affecting the children in the short-term sense but also in the long-run for reasons previously mentioned. Overall, I think this chapter does a fairly good job at explain the negative consequences family violence, more specifically child maltreatment, can have on a child. One thing that I wished the book talked about more was the legal aspect and implications with child abuse.
I read chapter 19. The area of child maltreatment and effects of violence on their psychological wellbeing interest me because of the work I do with children. The chapter focuses on primary areas related to child maltreatment, including emotional regulation, attachment, psychopathology, and memory. The information in this chapter relates directly to family violence because of the direct effect (and often long lasting effects) that maltreatment has on children and their families. I thought while reading the chapter that the authors did well in providing examples and case studies of how the maltreatment of children effects their present wellbeing as well as their long term wellbeing.
The section discussing emotional regulation discussed that children who have been maltreated have higher levels of internalizing and externalizing behavior problems that children who have not experienced maltreatment. It was interesting that studies show how maltreated children pay closer attention to expressions in others that are threat related, such as angry expressions. This makes sense, as they are probably more likely to be ultra sensitive to aggressive situations and relate angry facial expressions to angry actions. It also stated that these children are more often unable to regulate their peer interactions when they become hostile. These children tend to behave in a way that displays fear, anger or aggression. This makes sense, as many of the children I see who have been abused only know how to interact in the manner their parents do, which often results in anger. Therefore, the children are going to react in a way outside the home that they have seen displayed in their home.
The next area related to child maltreatment is attachment. This area directly relates to family issues, as the child begins attachments with their caregivers. They will then go out into the world exhibiting attachments similar to those they have learned at home. As the book discusses, maltreated children are more likely to have disorganized or disoriented attachment issues where the child freezes or becomes still or has a hesitation towards the caregiver. The book suggests that a child’s attachment security effects their cognitive process and memory which then directly can affect their relationships later in life.
The psychopathology section is brief and explains more obvious information. For example, maltreated children are more likely to develop depressive symptoms in their youth and increase the chance of depression in adulthood. These children are often more likely to develop behavioral symptoms such as ADHD, ODD, and PTSD. I see this all the time in working with kids. One of the most frustrating parts of working with families is teaching the parents that it is not just the children that need to change their behavior that the parents need to change theirs as well.
The memory section, as discussed today in class, seems to be the most complex area. I say this only because it encompasses so much for the child. Not only do memories of the actual maltreatment become an issue, but memories of an entire childhood can be changed or viewed in a way that may be different for siblings or actuality. The concept of memory is so interesting because memory itself can be a coping mechanism for children. They can block out what they do not want to relive or change what actually happened into something that is easier for them to relive. This “self protecting” concept with memory is extraordinary, but can make things difficult regarding legal/court issues as discussed in today’s class. It can also affect the child late into adulthood if they regain their memory or feel that their childhood was different from what siblings or other family members report.
I decided to read chapter 7 because my expert topic is family influence. This chapter is pretty much all about my expert topic but I want to touch on another area of interest before I get into the main focus. One of the first things that the chapter provides is a look at how aggression in childhood correlates with aggression in adulthood. Correlation for low aggression in childhood to low aggression in adulthood was similar for both male and females with both being in mid 30s for percentage. Something I was very interested in was the numbers associated with high aggression. 47% of males maintained high aggression while only 18% of females maintained high aggression. The book suggests differential socialization of males and female as the cause for these numbers. I have been researching gender differences and the social creation of gender basically since I became a psychology major so this suggestion caught my attention. I would be interested to see these numbers compared with a similar study done in Tahiti or a Native American tribe where gender roles and expectations are very different.
The main focus of this chapter is the intergenerational continuity of aggression. Most of the studies talked about were longitudinal. Results of one study showed that there is a reciprocal relationship between parent aggression and child aggression. This mean that aggression from the child may spark aggression-promoting parenting and this parenting may spark aggression in the child. There is a common theme within this chapter is the influence of parent aggression on child aggression which may carry on to adulthood. Observation of parent behavior influences children for the short-term and for the long-term. Children are influenced in their short-term processes because they are likely to immediately mimic parental behaviors. For the long-term, children identify strongly with their parents and tend to adopt their parent’s scripts for behavior. They tend to see the world how their parents see it because they believe this view to be the “right” view. Parent modeling is important but it is not the only factor to aggression.
There have been findings or genetic influences on aggression. I took this as kind of the same thing as genetic influence on personality. That just means that while genes have an impact, they are not the sole, or even main, factor on whether a person is aggressive or not. Environmental factors interact with genes to determine aggression levels. For example, a certain gene may cause higher levels of aggression (when compared to another who doesn’t have that gene) only when the child is exposed to high stress situations.
When it comes to familial influence, a couple of things were found. One is that positive discontinuities can improve a child’s psychosocial adjustment. Another thing that was looked at is what impacts the child the most. When comparing a children’s aggression it was found that a poor current environment for the child predicted a greater level of aggression than the parent’s past poor environment. Something I didn’t really think about is parent’s unintentional conditioning of their children. Children may be unintentionally reinforced for their aggressive behavior through coercive family interactions. Also, when parents punish and abuse their children, they condition them to experience anger as a response and that can make socialization for the child difficult.
This chapter helps explain that abused children or children raised in an aggressive environment may become aggressive themselves and that aggressiveness may continue into adulthood especially for males.
For this reading assignment, I chose to read chapter 19. A lot of the information I was not surprised by and seemed pretty common sense. However, while I was reading it, it was really distressing to think about the number of children that are abused every day in the world and use different ways discussed in the book to cope and deal with their feelings of hurt. It breaks my heart to think about people that harm their children, I could not imagine laying a hand on one of my loved ones. What most interested you in the chapter? I found it interesting reading on page 356 that the relationships that children have with attachment security to people has an impact on memory and many cognitive process including forensic evidence. Reading it really shocked me, but then I also thought about it and it makes sense that your closeness to a person will change your memories and thought processes of events involving the person. I think about that in my life not involving violence, I want to expect the best out of the people around me and often make excuses for peoples behaviors when they disappointment. I can see how a person would alter their memories and ideas about an event if they care about the person that was abusing them. What was most surprising to you? I think the information on victim interviewing surprised me the most. I have not experience an incident that I was interview about a situation, but I can see how there would be difficulty with recall of traumatic events. Testimony is so important legally for cases about abuse, but clearly it is hard for there to be accuracy in story telling when trauma is involved. I was blown away in class today when you were talking about the girl who claimed her grandfather had abused them as children and the fact that her sisters story eventually matched her story. It's crazy how manipulation and repetition can completely change the way someone thinks something happened. It's funny how our brains work and we can tell ourselves things and believe it's true after a certain amount of conditioning. How does the chapter you read relate to family violence (be specific). Well, children are an important part to family and are often victims of violence by the people that they live with and care about. Child abuse has huge implications to a persons life as discussed in the chapter. So not only so they experience early on in life, but usually it follows them around their entire lives. Also, generally if children are being abuse in the household the other parent is too, if it is a two parent household. So there is not only child abuse, but adult abuse taking place, which makes it an easy place for violence to be learned and used among other member in the family, such as siblings. Are there elements of the chapter that relate to your area of expertise? Yes. If so, what are they and how do they further develop your understanding of your topic? Well, my topic is on rape, particularly date rape among adolescents, and child abuse can be a hung contributor to action like being a person that date rapes others or being the victim of date rape. Often times people that have been abused either end up abusing others or being abused again by someone else. And as we know, rape is a violence about power, which makes sense in the context of date rape, because the rapist is drugging the person and having complete power over that person. Also, if the person is an adolescent, they are likely still experiencing violence at home by their parent, so they take out their "bad feelings" on harming others. I think there are significant implications of child abuse on rape.
Chapter 19 talked about 3 main things: the adverse emotional regulation of children who had been maltreated, the mental health problems they faced as adults, and the different ways in which their memory of the abuse was affected by their coping strategies. The end of the chapter also dealt with some of the methodological problems that have faced this type of research.
I was most interested in the ways that maltreatment affected attachment in children. The authors state that maltreated children develop insecure bonds that make it much harder for them to form secure attachments later in life. They also state that these insecure bonds (especially disorganized bond) are much more likely to lead to more mental health problems later in life, which was probably the fact that surprised me most. These facts relate to my topic of expertise very well, as most serial rapists experience some type of abuse in their childhood. Also, most rapists appear to have very insecure bonds with their mother, especially, but also with their father. For rapists, at least, the attachment to the mother seems to be more important. (These facts are gleaned from a book called Sex Crimes by Holmes & Holmes.) These facts help me to better understand why rapists have problems with their mother and why many of them can be diagnosed with some type of mental health problem….typically a personality disorder. However, there was another interesting fact to me, and that was that abused children have a hard time regulating their emotions, even figuring out what emotion is the correct one. This again, ties into my subject, as most rapists will project their emotions onto the victims (usually emotions of helplessness, victimization, and rage). Some rapists will rape because they are trying to “get even” with all the bad things (their perception) women have done to them. This indicates to me that they have a lack of emotional regulation- they are not able to regulate their anger. Also, I don’t believe that they are able to put things into perspective, so that every time some women does something this particular rapist doesn’t like, they need to “get back” at them. They don’t remember the good, only the bad. This can be rather extreme, but it does demonstrate how unhealthy it can be to not be able to properly regulate, understand, and identify your emotions.
This chapter relates very well to the topic of family violence. It demonstrates how unhealthy it is for children to be in a household where they are the victims of violence. It shows, through empirical research, the very long-term effects that abuse to children can have. These long-term effects are in multiple areas a child’s life and can take a long time to resolve, if they are even able to do so. Also, it increases the risk that these children will later form insecure attachments that may lead to them being the perpetrators of violence, instead of the victims of it.
I found it interesting how they mentioned the fact that not all children are doomed from child maltreatment. I know a lot of people that I know grew up in families where they weren't allowed to experience the necessary experiences in life or was mistreated by their parents, but somehow someway managed to defeat the odds and grow to be a very successful young adult. It states that the children that come out positive from maltreatment situations usually had at least one positive, secure relationship with someone who took time to listen, understand, and help them develop into a positive individual. Looking back on the people I know that prospered from situations like this I know exactly where their positive relationship came from and it makes much more sense now how they beat the odds of turning out corrupted.
Something that surprised me in this chapter was that maltreatment can not only cause insecurities with different types of attachments as kids grow older, but it has a significant affect on Memory. This let's us know that child maltreatment can have an even bigger affect on someone than we would anticipate, because an affected memory messes with your development academically.
This chapter relates to family violence because maltreatment itself is a form of violence. Any form of violence has a negative affect on SOMEBODY. Maltreatment could be anything from neglecting time with a child or being verbally or physically abusive. Either way it will cause a child to have attachment issues as they grow older and develop other personal relationships. Maltreatment that refers to child neglect keeps the kids from learning environments and experiencing necessary situations to help them understand their surroundings and understand how to deal with and handle certain situations.
This chapter doesn't compare much to my area of expertise "Inside the mind of a rapist", but I know that it has been studied that a lot of rapists experience abuse as a child from their mothers making them need to feel dominant over women. Which unfortunately leads to rape sometimes. This is the only way I can see this sections relating to my topic.
I read chapter 19, which is about how child maltreatment and family abuse can affect the child’s emotional affect, memory, and attachment. In the chapter, child maltreatment is not clearly defined, as the definition is one that has changed over time and has not been brought to a consensus. The chapter does state that many researchers maintain that the definition should focus on specific acts that endanger a child. I think it is important to discuss how these acts can have a profound and lasting effect on the child’s psychosocial development and long-term life outcomes. This chapter discusses it in three senses, emotional affect, attachment, and memory.
Child maltreatment is a serious and devastating problem of family violence. It, in my mind, is the worst type of family violence, besides murder. Children do not deserve any harm to them; they do not know about the evils of the world and have not done anything bad that would warrant beating them or hurting them in other ways. Even if a child misbehaves, violence is not the answer. One important development in early childhood is the development of emotion regulation. This is developed in early parent-child interactions and relationships, thus it is important that this relationship and interaction is one of love, not violence and fear. Research shows that child maltreatment causes damage to the ability to recognize, express, and understand emotions. There have been several studies that concluded that children who witness an angry simulated interaction, especially involving their mothers, behave more aggressively than those who do not witness such events. It does not only affect their anger behavior however. Studies show that physically abused boys have more distress in response to witnessing these interactions and more fear, especially when things are not resolved. They also are able to identify angry emotional expressions with less input than those who are not abused. These children may act out in school and other setting of such. One important finding was that abused children are more likely to attribute anger and hostility to situations where there is none, in fact. They were more sensitive to hostility and would jump to defend themselves with anger, even when provoked in everyday peer relations. It is obvious how dangerous child maltreatment and family violence is to children and their future life. If one cannot learn emotional regulation, they will have the problem and never be able to fully interact with others without the risk of anger. It doesn’t only affect emotional regulation, however.
Child maltreatment and family violence also affects the attachments these children form with their caregivers. It is quite known that the attachment formed between child and caregiver in the first years of life is the most vital. But how does family violence affect this? What happens if that attachment is not secure because of family violence? These are important questions sociologists studied. They found that maltreated children are likely to be insecurely attached, with an alarming rate as high as 95%. Toddlers and infants who witness aggressive family interactions and maltreatment are likely to exhibit behavioral freezing, dazing, stilling, and apprehension of the caregiver. Since these early interactions are so vital, these outcomes can lead to significant problems later in life, including mental health problems. The chapter explains that attachment security affects memory and other cognitive processes in ways that are important to relationships, clinical assessment and intervention, and forensic interviews. This brings me to the third effect of family violence and child maltreatment.
Children who witness these anger interactions and are maltreated may develop psychopathology later on in life. It is important to note that not all maltreated children develop serious mental health problems. There is an increased risk of depression in adulthood for children who are abused and neglected. For children who experienced this within the first 5 years of life, the risk is increased. It may also result in higher rates of ADHD, oppositional disorder, and PTSD. Many maltreated children have personality disorders, substance abuse, suicidal and self-harm behavior, somatization, anxiety, and dissociation. PTSD is a very important problem associated with family violence. This may affect memory in children who are abused.
Many of the children who are maltreated and suffer from PTSD have unusually accurate memories of the trauma event. Researchers explain this because the heightened focus on the event and anger cues makes the children focus and remember the memories. There are some maltreated children that go a different route. They may try to avoid the memories and reminders of the family violence. This may make their memories less accurate and is seen as a coping strategy.
I don’t think that there was anything that really surprised me from the chapter. It is all pretty much common knowledge. The only thing that I could say I didn’t know before was that being maltreated and experiencing family violence can affect your memory. I knew that you could repress memories, but I never thought of it thoroughly until reading this chapter. The fact that the memories are dependent on how severe the abuse was and how attached the child is to the person giving the abuse makes sense. It is sad that some people can experience something so horrible and have perfect or near perfect memories of it. Child maltreatment is a subset of family violence. It is typically defined as being done by the caregiver. The caregiver is part of that person’s family. Child maltreatment may not be just being abused yourself. It may also contain witnessing violence and anger between parents, siblings and parents, etc. Witnessing violence has a profound effect on all the things listed above. It definitely can cause a child to act out and be more violent themselves. They learn what they see. I think it is vital for parents or caregivers to realize how damaging this can be to children and how much of an effect it can have on them for the rest of their lives. I understand people are going to argue and maybe even fight, but it would help significantly if they do it outside the realm of their child. They need to be conscientious about their surroundings. It doesn’t only hurt them, it hurts the ones they should love and try to protect most.
The chapter I read was Chapter 7, The Transmission of Aggressiveness Across Generations: Biological, Contextual, and Social Learning Processes. What I found to be the most interesting with this chapter is how observation plays such a large role in parenting, and how vital it is when trying to figure out if your child is aggressive, and how aggressive they actually are. In chapter 7, observation is when a parent sees their child take aggression out on a nonliving object such as a toy, or a wall, then the child is more likely to take his or her aggression out on a living object such as a human, or an animal. I am not a parent, but I have babysat kids who have had anger problems. If we were to identify the aggression early in life by observation then perhaps there wouldn’t me as much of an aggression problem later in life.
To me, the most shocking topic I found in this chapter was how, along with Theamoe, was when the chapter talked about how youth aggression and aggression-promoting parenting have reciprocal effects on each other. If a parent is being aggressive, and is promoting an aggressive parenting style, then the child is more likely to be aggressive towards the parents. This seems as if it is common sense; that if you preach a certain behavior then your child in turn will only copy that particular behavior. What I found to be shocking about it is that how often it is shown in families today. The more I think about it, the more I do see the occasional family in the supermarket, with the kid begging for candy. If the parent is aggressive towards them, by dragging them away from the candy then the child, in most cases, will throw the candy, kick, or scream. This is a simple example, but it just shows the commonalities of how aggression can be reciprocated.
This chapter relates directly to family violence by aggression being reciprocated, but the chapter also talks about how aggression can be passed on through generations. If the child is at risk for having the same temperament as their parent, then family violence is more likely to ensue.
This chapter also relates to my expert topic, which is elder abuse. If a parent is aggressive towards their children earlier in their life, when they were healthy and capable of living on their own, then their child may be aggressive towards them later in life when they are not capable of living on their own. This chapter would help explain why the child of an older adult would resort to elder abuse, rather than not using aggression in a situation where the elder is helpless.
Chapter 19 was packed full of really valuable and useful information. The effects the violence has on children is profound, and often overlooked. The chapter discusses how children can develop issues with all aspects of their lives. Things such as emotion regulation, attachment, psychopathology, and memory are all things that can be influenced by an overexposure to violence as a child. These aspects are so major in everyone’s lives that they can very well influence overall happiness and life satisfaction. I think that the chapter does a good job of defining maltreatment, and that this definition reflects the severity of maltreatment in an appropriate way. “Child maltreatment, in the form of aggression and violence against children, is one of the most profound failures of a social environment to support normal development. Maltreating families do not provide many of the experiences that theories of normal development view as important for healthy development,” (Toth, et al, 352). The magnitude of the effects that violence and maltreatment of children is clear within this definition, and the importance is further explained in the rest of the chapter.
While this chapter provides a lot of great information on maltreatment and its effects, it does not address the issue of cultural differences in violence acceptance. Being my expert topic, I thought I would look more into how maltreatment is accepted across different cultures. There are many issues taking place across other cultures that deal with child abuse, many of which are acceptable within that culture or religion. Here is one news article about an Islamic child who was forced to marry an 80-year-old man, and was forced to return back to him after trying to escape. http://westernexperience.wordpress.com/2009/08/27/how-do-we-stop-this-child-abuse-in-islamic-culture/
This article also discusses the difficulties that Western civilizations have in understanding the Islamic and other Eastern ways of life, because Western point of view is so very different from that of Eastern culture. This brings us to the issue of whether or not this should be considered child abuse. From a Western prospective, these acts would absolutely be considered abuse. But the Islamic culture does not look down on these behaviors and it is viewed as an acceptable marriage and way of life. Therefore, it is difficult for anyone to intervene and tell this couple that the way they are living is unhealthy for the child. I think it is extremely important for research to be done and brought to the attention of leaders worldwide as to how maltreatment affects children for the rest of their lives and how damaging it is to their future.
I also found an online book that details the maltreatment across cultures and its overall effect on our world. There are a lot of politics involved with this issue, many of which are difficult to deal with and address. Child abuse and violence in different cultures is on problem that is going to take a lot more than a war to solve; it takes a change of mind.
http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=NLHYynLa_lsC&oi=fnd&pg=PA31&dq=child+maltreatment+in+africa&ots=kGyZrtE9Uw&sig=1uHmS43LSgQe2n7B11AC8qcDDOY#v=onepage&q=child%20maltreatment%20in%20africa&f=false
While reading through the different views on childcare, there are some cultures that may see the Western view of childrearing as abusive. Some cultures think that it is cruel to make the child sleep alone in a crib, or to send your children to daycare. Things like piercing your daughter’s ears or circumcising your son are also seen as abusive. While we may be able to look at the extreme Islamic culture and clearly claim, “that is definitely abuse, how can they do that?” we must bear in mind that there are others that look at our way of life and saying the same thing. This is why an issue that is evident cross culturally is so difficult to tackle; because there are so many conflicting points of view. At the very least, we, as psychologists, need to understand and accept these differences between cultures. We also need to research as much as we can about the effects of different types of raising children, and realize that our way of doing things may not be the right way for everyone.
I chose to read chapter 19 for this assignment. A few years ago I had an interesting encounter at my pediatricians office which ties in nicely to this topic. My daughter is small.. really small. She is nine years old and she is less than four foot tall and not quite 40 pounds. She is basically the size of your average six year old. I was lucky enough to have the same pediatrician as my husband and his family use to have, because they are all small too. His family has had growth problems and many of them have needed hormone therapy to grow correctly. We don't have to wonder why she doesn't grow right, we had a heads up on what to look for. Her doctor also told me about some interesting research he had come across recently. It has been shown before that many children from abusive homes have stunted growth, and now they are finding that thier children, even those raised in nurturing environments and never suffering from abuse, show the same patterns of stunted growth. My daughter is the child of a person from an abused home who had growth deficiencies beyond those expected from only having a hormone deficiency. This chapter didn't focus on growth patterns, but on the psychological effects of being raised in an abusive environment. It seems that children raised in an abusive environment seem to suffer more than the adults. They not only have to deal with the effects of violence while they are in the situation, but it has such a detrimental effect on their development and residual effects all throughout their lives. The text looks at problems with childrens attachment, emotional regulation, and memory. The interruption in developing healthy attachments at an early age becomes very difficult to reverse. And as with the emotional regulating, there may be a link to the childs reactions to the world around them. This can be linked to the visual system and over attending to what may be percieved as agressive cues when none are present. The developing visual system becomes trained to percieve the world in terms of standing watch for things that may be dangerous instead of attending to the world around them as if it were a place to love and explore. As children our brains are so flexible and plastic... but as we age these processes become more fixed and rigid. Basically if we are trained as children to constantly look for danger, it's not likely that as an adult we will suddenly have a moment of enlightenment and stop visually searching for the threats around us. this chapter also discusses the memory effects for children who have been abused. there seems to be a dichotomy that either these children over attenuate to the details and have highly detailed recollection of the event, or they have foggy recollection and impaired memory of the event. the research looks at this in terms of the childrens coping mechanism.
When we look at family violence we have to take into consideration that the littlest members of the family, the children invovled, are not always the sourse of the agression but merely bystanders to it. Children raised in violent homes do not have the options to leave or didstance themselves from the abuse. Even when the abuse is not directed towards them it will still have an effect on their development. efforts are being made all the time to reduce abuse towards children through programs to educate people to signs of abuse and what they can do to prevent it. another approach may be to raise awareness of the effects on children who live in homes where they only see abuse, but are not themselves abused. Would those who stay in abusive relationships because they share children with their abuser leave sooner if they knew the children may have better outcomes in a single parent home than they would in a home where they witness abuse?
I found the chapter on trauma to be especially interesting. I have always been interested in the psychological effects on someone who has suffered some sort of trauma. I also have been interested in memory, so tying the two together is something I think should definitely be looked into. Trauma can be a double-edged sword by either hindering or enhancing a memory. When witnesses are required to rely on memory for a legal case, the level of trauma involved could make or break the case. A victim could repress their memories of the incident and impair their ability to remember details. They could also not be able to repress it and have constant reminders haunting them on a daily basis. Those who relive their memories continuously may deal with even more emotional issues due to the neverending repetition of the incident. Memory can also be tricky in that it can be deceived and manipulated. For a small child, all it may take is a trusted adult saying “So that’s what happened, RIGHT?” to sway them to change their story or to support whatever evidence the adult is presenting. The child can eventually believe the lie as what really happened if they hear that version of the story enough times.
The chapter discusses how attachment can impact how a trauma may effect a child. Those first few years of a child’s life are when they develop that attachment, whether it be a strong, secure attachment, or a weak, strained relationship with their parents or caregivers. Unfortunately, at that young age, a child does not have the ability to remove themselves from a negative home situation. If their parents become abusive, the young child has no choice but to remain with them, further damaging the bond and attachment between them. The child may feel the strong connection that is meant to be between child and parent, however when abuse is involved, it becomes dangerous to stay so close. Ironically, the child may actually feel more strongly attached to the parent causing the abuse because they receive that mixed message of love & caring as well as fear & hurt.
Trauma at a young age can lead to other mental disorders later in life such as ADHD, depression, and of course PTSD. They can enter a domino effect of more and more issues piling on top of an already vulnerable individual. It can bring upon changes in behavior as well; drug or alcohol abuse, self-harming behavior, or social problems. When a child does not have the one source they can rely on, a strong parental figure, they can often feel lost and become unstable.
This applies to my expert topic in that migrants traveling through different countries on their way to the United States are subject to all kinds of trauma along the way. They may encounter gang members who will rob, rape, and beat them. They may witness someone become injured along the way, and forever be effected by what they saw. They suffer mentally during the long journey through the desert and riding on trains. They are exhausted and put in the spotlight by border guards at multiple checkpoints. If they are lucky enough to reach the US, they then have to begin anew and set up their lives here. The trauma may not end once they are on US soil, in fact, that may be when it starts to increase, and this time it comes in a foreign language. The struggles that these migrants go through to better their lives can and will stick with them forever.