Re: admitting abuse

["William F. Northey, Jr." <northey@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

>In our community CPS takes the position that a parent must acknowledge both
>the  abuse of their children and take responsibility for the abuse
>before the parent can have unsupervised visits with their children.  Yet, many
>stuck cases get hung up when a parent adamantly denies either the abuse or
>that it had any negative effects.  Despite a great amount of work, if a parent
>continues to deny these events, there is little chance for any reunification.
>Yet, in many cases, parent's can agree that in the future there will be no
>corporal punishment.  Also, in some cases, despite the parent's denial, enough
>work has been done that it appears the children will be reasonably safe.Is
>there any research that supports the idea that a parent "must" admit the abuse
>before the child is reasonably safe?  Or is this simply an ideological
>position that is based on clinical practice?  I am mostly thinking about
>physical
>abuse,

I don't know anything about the physical abuse literature, but the recent
meta-analysis by Hanson and Bussiere (1998) found no relationship between
denial and recidivism.  Now this data may be interpreted several different
ways, but I would suggest that this idea of "overcoming denial" is a
throwback to Freud which has been adopted by the "addictions" folks.  This
is not to say that taking responsibility _might_ not be a sufficient
condition for change, but it is in no way a necessary condition.  I have
seen no evidence that says one _must_ admit they have a problem (and take
"complete" responsibility for it) before there can be chance.  In fact, the
transtheorectical model of change proposed by Prochaska and DiClemente
would challenge such an assumption.  People, all people, change in a
variety of ways.  Some of those changes occur with out an awareness of a
problem, let alone admitting it to another person who might use such
information against them.  I work with juveniles accused of sexual offenses
and am often amazed of the expectation held out for these children.  Not
telling strangers about the most embarassing sexual experience one has ever
had is normal!!!  I would think the same could be said about adults who
hurt their children.

Bill


	Hanson, R. K. & Bussiere, M. T. (1998) Predicting relapse: A
meta-analysis of sexual offender recidivism studies.   Journal of
Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 66, 348-362.

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William F. Northey, Jr., Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Human Development and Family Studies
School of Family and Consumer Sciences
Bowling Green State University
Bowling Green, OH 43403-0254
419-372-7848 - Office
419-372-7854 - Fax
northey@bgnet.bgsu.edu
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