Project Title: How are assessment tools and chronologies used by health and social care professionals to identify child neglect?
Main supervisor: Professor Jane Appleton (jvappleton@brookes.ac.uk)
Closing date: 28th May 2019
Neglect is a common yet under-recognized form of child abuse. Across the UK, it is the most common category of abuse for children who are the subject of a Child Protection Plan, accounting for 48% of child protection plans at July 2017 (NSPCC, 2019). Neglect rarely comes to light as a result of a single incident and it often relies on practitioners making a judgement about the adequacy of on-going care in a family context. The use of chronologies is an area of increasing interest in neglect, as findings from some Serious Case Reviews have concluded that a chronology could have supported the earlier identification of risks to the child(ren) involved in the cases. This PhD studentship will adopt a mixed methods approach to address the following research question: How are assessment tools and chronologies used by health and social care professionals to identify neglect in either pre-school age children (or) school aged children? (The studentship is likely to focus on one age group only depending on the applicant’s interest area). Ethics Committee, Social Care and HRA approvals will need to be sought. Three/four research phases are proposed, including a systematic review of evidence; a document analysis of the use in one County Council of a neglect/child care development tool and chronologies; on-line survey with health, early years staff and social workers examining their views and semi-structured qualitative interviews with professionals.
Further details including eligibility criteria, stipend and details of how to apply are available via the Oxford Brookes website
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