Annual of social work, Vol. 19 No. 3, 2012.
Original scientific paper
EPIDEMIOLOGICAL RESEARCH OF PREVALENCE AND INCIDENCE OF FAMILY VIOLENCE ON CHILDREN IN CROATIA
Marina Ajduković
orcid.org/0000-0002-0561-9908
; Department of Social Work, Faculty of Law, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia
Ivan Rimac
orcid.org/0000-0003-4022-5856
; Department of Social Work, Faculty of Law, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia
Miroslav Rajter
; Department of Social Work, Faculty of Law, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia
Nika Sušac
orcid.org/0000-0002-8257-3472
; Department of Social Work, Faculty of Law, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
The paper presents the results of epidemiological research on the extent of family violence on children in the Republic of Croatia. The research used a two-phase design with a probability sample of children aged 11, 13 and 16 regularly enrolled into Croatian primary and secondary schools (N=3.644). Data was obtained within the international research FP7 project “BECAN – Balkan Epidemiological Study on Child Abuse and Neglect“. The research used the revised version of ISPCAN Child Abuse Screening Tool - Children’s Version (ICAST-C). The prevalence analysis has shown that the most prevalent form of family violence on children is psychological aggression (5th grade 59.0%; 7th grade 77.1%; 10th grade 82.5%), followed by corporal punishment (5th grade 56.1%; 7th grade 68.4%; 10th grade 72.3%), physical abuse (5th grade 26.2%; 7th grade 34.0%; 10th grade 40.7%). The psychological abuse (5th grade 22.8%; 7th grade 26.8%; 10th grade 34.8%) reveals to be the least frequent. A correlation is observed among all categories of violence on children and the highest one being between corporate punishment and physical abuse (from 0.599 to 0.674).
The most common perpetrators of psychological aggression, psychological abuse and corporal punishment are fathers and mothers. Among the 5th graders, the most common perpetrators of physical abuse are brothers. They are approximately equally common perpetrators of family violence towards girls and boys. Sisters more commonly occur as perpetrators of psychological aggression, corporal punishment and physical abuse on girls than on boys.
Most children did not find answering questions (95.2%) and being honest about violent experiences within family (90.8%) difficult. However, among those children who revealed that they had found it difficult to answer and be honest, there is statistically significant higher number of those with experience of violence within the family.
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Keywords
family violence on children; perpetrators of violence on children; ISPCAN Child Abuse Screening Tool; epidemiological research
Hrčak ID:
96677
URI
Publication date:
6.2.2013.
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