[Epidemiology of risks and child maltreatment in early childhood: a pilot study]

There is a lack of prevalence data of child maltreatment and neglect in German speaking countries. The aim of this pilot study was to develop a questionnaire as a generally useable method for surveys of early child maltreatment and to test its feasibility and usefulness. The pilot study of this methodology would also give a first indication of the prevalence of risk factors and of child maltreatment itself. The study was carried out in 21 day-care centres in Vorarlberg, Austria. The questionnaire was judged as very user-friendly and useable. Prevalence was 5.3 % for neglect and 1.2 % for abuse in the study sample. The results demonstrate that systematic data collection in the field of youth welfare is practicable in German speaking countries. In addition, day-care centres allow easy access to data collection. Further psychometric testing of the questionnaire with normative data samples and across different professional groups is required.