The Role of School Connectedness in the Relationship between Child Abuse and Child Behavior Problems: Exploring Protective Mechanisms and Pathways

Background and Purpose:

Child maltreatment is a significant issue that impacts a vast number of children and adolescents worldwide. Maltreatment is linked to various mental health problems and developmental challenges that persist beyond childhood. School represents one particularly important environment for children where they develop and implement important skills and socioemotional behaviors. Interestingly, research has found that school may serve as an important protective factor in buffering the effects of child maltreatment on youths’ undesirable behavioral outcomes. The current study aims to investigate the relationship between child abuse, school connectedness, and child behavior problems by evaluating two competing hypotheses: school connectedness will act as a buffer and mitigate the adverse effects of abuse on child behavior problems (H1), or,school connectedness will serve as a mediator between child abuse and child behavior problems (H2).

Methods:

The current study utilized data from the Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study, a longitudinal study that involved 4,898 families from 20 large urban cities. For the present study, the sample was limited to those with complete data (N=2,234). Child abuse was measured by mothers’ report at age 5 using two subscales of the Conflict Tactics Scale - Parent to Child Version, physical assault and psychological aggression. School connectedness was assessed through the focal child’s self-report at age 9, regarding the level of inclusiveness, happiness, closeness, and safety they experienced at school. Child internalizing and externalizing behavior problems were evaluated using the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL), as reported by the mothers when the child was 15 years old. Interaction effects were tested within a linear regression to examine the moderation effect of school connectedness on child behavioral problems, followed by a path analysis to evaluate the mediation effect of school connectedness on child behavioral problems.

Results:

The results of the moderation analysis demonstrated that school connectedness at age 9 was significantly associated with lower levels of externalizing and internalizing behavior problems at age 15. Additionally, physical abuse experienced at age 5 was significantly associated with externalizing behavior problems at age 15. There was no significant moderation effect of school connectedness on the relationship between physical/psychological abuse and child behavioral problems. The direct effects within the path analysis were consistent with the moderation model, with one exception: psychological abuse at age 5 was significantly linked to both externalizing and internalizing behavior problems at age 15. However, tests of indirect effects revealed no significant mediating effects of school connectedness on child behavior problems.

Conclusions and Implications:

The findings of our study indicate that school connectedness and physical/psychological abuse are independently associated with child behavior problems. However, we found no evidence to suggest that school connectedness buffers the impact of abuse or serves as a pathway through which abuse relates to externalizing/internalizing behaviors. These results suggest that while school connectedness may be important and helpful for children with maltreatment histories, increasing school connectedness alone is unlikely to be sufficient in buffering the impact of abuse on child behavior problems.