Citation

Donohue B, Romero V, Hill HH. Aggress. Violent Behav. 2006; 11(6): 626-640.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2006, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.avb.2005.08.007

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Despite high prevalence and severe negative consequences of child maltreatment (e.g., Brown, G. R., and Anderson, B., (1991). Psychiatric morbidity in adult inpatients with childhood histories of sexual and physical abuse. American Journal of Psychiatry, 148, 55-61; Jaudes, P. K., Ekwo, E., and Van Voorhis, J.V., (1995). Association of drug abuse and child abuse. Child Abuse and Neglect, 19, 1065-1075; Murphy, J. M., Jellinek, M., Quinn, D., Smith, G., and Goshkom, M., (1991). Substance abuse and serious child mistreatment: Prevalence, risk, and outcome in a court sample. Child Abuse and Neglect, 15, 197--211), the treatment of perpetrators and victims of child abuse and neglect remains grossly understudied (Behl, L. E., Conyngham, H. A., and May, P. F., (2003). Trends in child maltreatment literature. Child Abuse and Neglect, 27, 215-229). More than half of parentes founded for the abuse and neglect of their children have evidenced drug abuse, yet no treatments have been validated that concurrently address these problems. The reciprocal interaction between substance abuse and child maltreatment supports the need to concurrently treat these problems. This article illustrates the relationship between child maltreatment and parental substance abuse and proposes a behavioral model to explain the reciprocal influence of drug abuse and child maltreatment. A behavioral treatment plan that is designed to concurrently address drug abuse and child abuse is proposed and suggestions are made for future directions in this area.