Varieties of Child Maltreatment: An Overview
In the United States, nearly 700,000 children experience abuse each year, according to the National Children's Alliance (NCA). This alarming statistic underscores the importance of understanding the signs of child abuse and knowing how to respond.
Child abuse can take various forms, with neglect, physical abuse, and sexual abuse being the most common. Neglect, often the most common type, involves any scenario where a child's basic needs aren't being met, including emotional needs, healthcare, academics, and caregiver attention.
Emotional abuse, also known as psychological abuse, is a difficult-to-identify form of child abuse that creates a negative sense of self-worth in a child. Behaviors such as withholding love or affection, shaming, name-calling, rejection, and threatening can all be signs of emotional abuse. Symptoms of emotional abuse can include low self-esteem, social withdrawal, anxiety, aggression, and depression.
Physical abuse doesn't always result in visible injuries like a black eye. It can manifest as a spanking that leaves a child unable to sit for days, bruises and welts that never seem to go away, or injuries in unusual places. Children who experience physical abuse may not receive timely medical attention and may have stories that don't fit their injuries.
Sexual abuse is a specific form of child abuse involving someone engaging in a sexual act with a child. It can include touching or physical sexual acts, exposing a child to sexual elements like pornography or witnessing sexual acts and images. Approximately 7% of all child abuse cases and 65% of child-on-child abuse cases are sexual abuse specific, according to the NCA. Symptoms of sexual abuse may include decline in academics, challenges with keeping peer relationships, regressive behaviors, increase in risk-taking behaviors, preoccupation with sex and the genital area, low self-esteem, anxiety, fearfulness, and depression. Physical symptoms may include difficulty walking or sitting, painful or frequent urination, incontinence, swelling, itching, or pain in the genital area, sexually transmitted diseases, reluctance to participate in physical activities, unusual discharge from the genital area, bruises or bleeding.
If you, your child, or someone you know suspects a child is being abused, you can call or text the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline at 800-422-4453. If a child comes to you and says they've experienced abuse, experts recommend remaining calm, avoiding any expression of denial, shock, or disgust, resisting the urge to interrogate or ask doubt-oriented questions, reassuring the child that coming to you was the right thing and they've done nothing wrong, and reaching out to local authorities as soon as possible.
Agencies will allow you to remain anonymous in the reporting process. The "Quick exit" button on the page can be used to quickly leave the website and be redirected to Psych Central's landing page. Offering support and reassurance can help reinforce that a child has made the right decision if they come forward to express what they're going through, especially if it involves loved ones.
It's often better to be wrong about child abuse suspicions and report them rather than right but have never acted. Child abuse allegations require immediate attention. If a child comes to you, speaking with the local authorities as soon as possible can help ensure that child's safety.
