“Kids are in the middle of it” – Child protection practitioners reflect on indicators of coercive control and situational couple violence

How relevant is differentiating between coercive control and situational couple violence in statutory child protection practice with families experiencing domestic and family violence?

In this small scale self-selected qualitative study we interviewed six Australian child protection practitioners and asked them to consider four fictional vignettes, two containing indicators of high levels of coercive control and two containing indicators of situational couple violence. We asked participants to reflect on whether the vignettes represented the kind of situations they encounter in practice and how they would be likely to respond.

Participants indicated that both coercive control and situational couple violence were common in their practice and that each of these violence types presented challenges. They highlighted a range of priorities and challenges for meeting the needs of children in families experiencing violence who come to the attention of statutory child protection authorities. Further, they noted the need to acknowledge the impact on children and young people when neither parent or caregiver can parent in a non-violent and safe manner.

Child protection practice frameworks should address the risk of harm to children and young people posed by situational couple violence, and not just coercive control.

© 2024 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd.

This is an open access article under the CC BY license ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ ).