Child Welfare Decision Making in Context Part 1 – Influences of the Decision Making Ecology on Permanency

Objectives: Practitioners and researchers have postulated that case-level child welfare decisions are influenced by factors above and beyond the characteristics of the children and families reported for child maltreatment,... [ view full abstract ]

Objectives: Practitioners and researchers have postulated that case-level child welfare decisions are influenced by factors above and beyond the characteristics of the children and families reported for child maltreatment, but we know little about how these influence key decisions that affect the trajectories of child welfare cases. This research expands the body our knowledge of the Decision Making Ecology (Baumann, Dalgleish, Fluke & Kern, 2011) by examining the hypothesis that child, caseworker, and agency characteristics influence permanency related decisions.

Methods: In 2015 and in 2017, an online general staff survey was administered to child welfare workers within a Southeastern US state.  The survey used field-tested scales measuring attitudes about child welfare work, perceptions of workload, organizational culture and climate, child welfare tenure, and questions about the extent to which their personal experiences, attitudes, and beliefs influenced their practice. Worker characteristics data were linked to child level administrative data reflecting case characteristics. Dependent variables examined were the placements during investigation or assessment and eventual exit status for children in care at the end of the placement spell. Multivariate multi-level event analyses were performed using case- and worker-linked data.

Results:  Analyses reveal that in addition to child characteristics and regional variations, characteristics of the assigned workers were associated with the risk-ratios of the outcomes.  

 Conclusions: The results of this study suggest that child welfare workers’ personal attitudes and characteristics do have associations with child welfare decisions, a finding that offers insights into and has implications for workforce configuration, staff development, performance monitoring, and quality improvement.