Explore current social developments, issues, and controversies concerning young victims! The Victimization of Children: Emerging Issues keeps students and practitioners working with young victims on the cutting edge of the latest research developments regarding crimes against children. Leading experts from the legal, medical, and sociological communities explore some of the most urgent issues involving child victims. Researchers and practitioners in victim services, social work, mental health, public health, and criminal justice will all benefit from this useful resource. While numerous books have been written on the topic of child abuse and neglect, few delve into the more contemporary issues and problems. The Victimization of Children fills a large void in the literature by offering advanced discussions of today’s most relevant topics, making this book an in-depth supplement to generic textbooks. Forward-thinking and thought-provoking, this timely resource provides sound research to expand your knowledge base. This book provides insights into such contemporary issues as: the victimization of youths on the Internet children as victims of war and terrorism spatial patterns of child maltreatment—the concentration of child maltreatment within certain geographical areas religion-related child abuse the role of health care professionals in response to child victimization children with disabilities—abuse, neglect, and the child welfare system fetal homicide—emerging statutory and judicial regulation of third-party assaults legal and social issues surrounding closed-circuit television testimony of child victims and witnesses juvenile courts and their role in addressing family violence The Victimization of Children provides tables, figures, and the latest statistics of various aspects of child victimization to complement the experts’ contributions. This book offers new and different responses and interventions to meet the increasingly diverse contexts and situations within which child maltreatment occurs. Emerging trends are explored within this book from a cross-section of disciplines, including law, sociology, criminal justice, psychology, and health services.

​ This book describes the concept of child victimization in all its facets. Millions of young people throughout the world face violence, sexual, physical, and emotional abuse and exploitation on a daily basis. The worldwide victimization of young people can be prevented, or, at least, its incidence can be greatly reduced, if purposeful action is taken to do so. This volume researches and documents some of the ways in which young people throughout the world are victimized, and suggests strategies for preventing various forms of child vistimization. Eight distinct forms of victimization are identified and analyzed in detail. Included are discussions on child prostitution and pornography, economic exploitation through child labor and trafficking, physical and other abuse inflicted on young people in schools and other institutions, the use of children as armed combatants, and the denial of the basic needs and rights of children to such things as home and to education. In each chapter the authors discuss the nature of the victimization, its global dimensions and prevalence, and the measures governments and/or others are taking, or failing to take, to combat the harm based on the concept that youth victimization is a form of government crime.

Children are the most criminally victimized segment of the population, and a substantial number face multiple, serious "poly-victimizations" during a single year. And despite the fact that the priority emphasis in academic research and government policy has traditionally gone to studying juvenile delinquents, children actually appear before authorities more frequently as victims than as offenders. But at the same time, the media and many advocates have failed to note the good news: rates of sexual abuse, child homicide, and many other forms of victimization declined dramatically after the mid-1990s, and some terribly feared forms of child victimization, like stereotypical stranger abduction, are remarkably uncommon. The considerable ignorance about the realities of child victimization can be chalked up to a field that is fragmented, understudied, and subjected to political demagoguery. In this persuasive book, David Finkelhor presents a comprehensive new vision to encompass the prevention, treatment, and study of juvenile victims, unifying conventional subdivisions like child molestation, child abuse, bullying, and exposure to community violence. Developmental victimology, his term for this integrated perspective, looks at child victimization across childhood's span and yields fascinating insights about how to categorize juvenile victimizations, how to think about risk and impact, and how victimization patterns change over the course of development. The book also provides a valuable new model of society's response to child victimization - what Finkelhor calls the Juvenile Victim Justice System - and a fresh way of thinking about barriers that victims and their families encounter when seeking help. These models will be very useful to anyone seeking to improve the way we try to help child victims. Crimes against children still happen far too often, but by proposing a new framework for thinking about the issue, Childhood Victimization opens a promising door to reducing its frequency and improving the response. Professionals, policymakers, and child advocates will find this paradigm-shifting book to be a valuable addition to their shelves.

The means by which women and children are most often subjected to victimization are discussed here, along with the causes and the legal avenues available. Part One examines family issues, including child abuse, domestic violence, and missing or abducted children, and Part Two examines their sexual exploitation. Part Three explores violent crimes against children (e.g., murder, rape and assault), while Part Four is a study of violence against women. Prostitution, pornography, sexual harassment and stalking are the subjects of Part Five. Finally, legislative responses are studied in Part Six.

Clinical and Psychological Perspectives on Foul Play examines a wide range of factors that can influence how police determine foul play in possible homicide cases and in other possible crimes. It develops a new theory of uncertainty at micro, meso, and macro levels to explain how law professionals arrive at this decision. Specifically, it examines the extent to which uncertainty in these situations can be influenced by media coverage, family and community pressures, socioeconomic factors, demographic elements of victims, as well as police knowledge and resources. Written for forensic practitioners, this book describes how these professionals can consult with law enforcement on such issues as the staging of crime scenes to mask intent, the initiation of community strategies to find missing persons, and the reliability of behavioral profiles. The latest research from the Foul Play Project and the Missing Persons Project are employed to support the recommendations in this book and to point the way toward further research in this area.

This data-rich volume reviews short- and long-term consequences of residential or institutional care for children across the globe as well as approaches to reducing maltreatment. Up-to-date findings from a wide range of developing and developed countries identify forms of abuse and neglect associated with institutionalization and their effects on development and pathology in younger children, adolescents, and alumni. The sections on intervention strategies highlight the often-conflicting objectives facing professionals and policymakers balancing the interests of children, families, and facilities. But despite many national and regional variations, two themes stand out: the universal right of children to live in safety, and the ongoing need for professionals and community to ensure this safety. Included among the topics: Maltreatment and living conditions in long-term residential institutions for children Outcomes from institutional rearing Recommendations to improve institutional living Historical, political, socio-economic, and cultural influences on Child Welfare Systems Latin American and the Caribbean, African, Asian, Middle-Eastern, Western and Eastern European countries and the United States of America are presented. Child Maltreatment in Residential Care will inform psychology professionals interested in the role of residential care in the lives of children, and possibilities for improved outcomes. It will also interest social workers and mental health practitioners and researchers seeking evidence-based interventions for families adopting children from residential care.

Children who receive child welfare services are a vulnerable group, and their numbers are growing. All who care about them need to be fully informed about current outcomes, indicators of success and failure, and best practices. This second edition of Child Welfare: Connecting Research, Policy, and Practice has a special focus on Canadian child welfare and contains entirely new material on these important themes. The book highlights major developments in child welfare and shows how these inform directions taken in research, policy, and practice. The book includes new sections on Indigenous issues and best practices, and several of its chapters review efforts to increase supports for families in need. Contributions from new and international authors illustrate the endemic nature of child welfare challenges and how we can learn from these experiences. Contributors provide recommendations for promoting best practice and enhancing resilience among children and families. Closing chapters within each section and at the end of the book summarize key theoretical and practice issues along with recommendations to improve the research, policy, and practice continuum in child welfare. The challenge is to translate good research into policy and practice in ways that enhance the life chances of children who need our care and protection.