Caregiver Substance Abuse and Children's Exposure to Violence in a Nationally Representative Child Welfare Sample

Abstract

Using data from the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being II, this article examines the impact of caregiver substance abuse on children's exposure to violence in the home in a nationally representative sample of families involved with child protective services. Logistic regression analyses indicate an increased risk of witnessing mild and severe violence in the home for children whose primary caregiver was abusing alcohol or drugs. However, analyses did not find statistically significant relationships between child report of direct victimization in the home by mild or severe violence and caregiver alcohol or drug abuse.

Keywords:

• child welfare
• children
• exposure to violence
• intimate partner violence
• logistic regression analysis
• substance abuse
• trauma
• witnessing violence

Acknowledgments

Ms. Seay is supported by a National Institute on Drug Abuse Predoctoral Fellowship (#5T32DA015035) and a Doris Duke Fellowship. Support for this project was provided by the National Institute of Mental Health (R03MH082203).