Child-care personnel's failure to report child maltreatment: some Swedish evidence

Professionals who are legally required to report suspicions of child abuse and neglect to child protective agencies have often been found not to do so. In this article, 341 child-care institutions in three suburbs of Stockholm were surveyed for suspected child abuse. Of the 3,737 children attending these child-care institutions, 3% (N = 112) were suspected of being maltreated. Of these suspected cases, only 37% were reported to the Child Protective Agencies (CPA). Furthermore, interviews with the directors of the nursery schools revealed that there was a considerable delay in reporting suspicions of child abuse to the CPA. A follow-up study conducted approximately 5 years after the suspicions were first identified showed that 43% of the suspected children were still unknown to the CPA. Data also indicates that one possible reason for the low degree of reporting is the way in which the reports have been processed by the CPA.