Family Reunification and Socioeconomic Disparities: A Population-Level and Multilevel Longitudinal Analysis

Background/Purpose: Although poverty and lack of social support services are well established risk factors for child maltreatment far less is known about the effects that preventative social services and poverty reduction policies have on child protection service trajectories. The province of Quebec has been one of the most socially progressive jurisdictions in North America, offering an array of poverty reduction and family support services, ranging from universal free health care, subsidized public child care, and a very progressive income tax redistribution system. Despite these policies, socioeconomic disadvantages continue to be important risk factors for child maltreatment and subsequent child protection services within the province. While socioeconomic disadvantages in the province have been previously found to be influential on out-of-home placements, this study measures the impact that regional disparity in socioeconomic vulnerabilities and preventative social services spending has on reunification for children placed in out-of-home care.

 

Methods: This study uses a multilevel longitudinal research design that draws data from three sources: (1) longitudinal administrative data from Quebec's child protection agencies; (2) 2006 and 2011 Canadian Census data; and, (3) intra-province health and social service spending data. The clinical population studied consists of all children (N = 29, 040) placed in out-of-home care for the first time between April 1, 2002 and March 31, 2010, and followed for a minimum of 18 months from their initial out-of-home placement. In this study, family reunification is the dependent variable, while covariates examined at the child level include, age at placement, ethno-racial background, gender, reason for investigation, number of investigations, source of the referral, and request for youth criminal justice services. Socioeconomic disadvantages and preventative funding for health and social services are examined at the regional level across 166 community health and social service territories in the province.

 

Results: Preliminary multilevel hazard results suggest that regional disparities in socioeconomic vulnerabilities and lack of preventative funding for health and social services contribute to the decreased likelihood of reunification. Specifically, poverty and a lack of preventative spending account for over forty percent of the variation in the likelihood of reunification for children aged less than 5 years, and over twenty percent for children 5 to 11 years at initial placement. Whereas for older children primarily investigated for behavioural problems, socioeconomic disadvantages and preventative social service spending did not significantly explain variations in the likelihood of reunification.

 

Conclusions and Implications: Although Quebec provides a range of preventative services to support vulnerable families, socioeconomic and a lack of preventative social services spending continue to matter as that they predict the placement trajectories of children in out-of-home care.  This study testifies to the need to expand efforts to ensure that a supportive structure – integration of community partners and preventative social services needed to support child protection intervention – is in place in order to be proactive in addressing the challenges faced by vulnerable families and not reactive to family difficulties.