Development and Pilot of the Race and Class Bias (RCB) Scale for Child Welfare Practitioners

Background: Decades of research have highlighted racial and socioeconomic disparities for families in child welfare, with calls to address inequities through trainings and structural change. Yet, to date, few measures have been developed to assess recognition of racial and class biases among child welfare practitioners, one key step in addressing implicit biases and advocating for change. As part of an ongoing project to develop, implement, and evaluate an innovative model to improve family engagement and increase awareness of racial bias, the researchers developed and piloted a Racial Class Bias scale for child welfare among a sample of practitioners in a large Southern state.

Methods: This study consisted of three phases: 1) scale development; 2) scale piloting using exploratory factor analysis; and 3) scale validation using confirmatory factor analysis. In the first phase of the project, n = 71 child welfare stakeholders participated focus groups to explore the root causes of challenges for families in child welfare. Through these focus groups, the concepts of racial and class bias emerged, as well as items related to implicit and structural biases that resulted in disparities for children of color and children from low socioeconomic statuses. The research team, in conjunction with federal technical assistance providers, developed the RC Bias scale based on themes that emerged from the focus groups and two existing measures that assessed awareness of structural biases and implicit biases. A nine-item scale was piloted with a group of n = 152 child welfare practitioners in three regions of the state. Exploratory factor analysis was conducted utilizing Varimax rotation to identify factors and structure of the 9 items. Next, the factor structure was tested using a separate sample of n = 352 child welfare practitioners who had enrolled in an online child welfare training academy. Confirmatory factor analysis was conducted with the factors identified from the exploratory factor analysis. All analyses were conducted in Stata, Version 16.

Results: Assumptions of adequate sample size, multivariate normality, and linearity for exploratory factor analysis were met and satisfied, and Bartlett’s test of Sphericity for the EFA (0.82) was statistically significant. Two main factors were identified that explained 68.05% of the total variance; eight of the nine items loaded onto the two factors. Items on the first factor reflected implicit bias recognition and items on the second factor reflected structural bias. The confirmatory factor analysis with the two-factor structure demonstrated adequate fit (RMSEA = 0.06; CFI = 0.98; SRMR = 0.03). All items loaded significantly and each factor demonstrated adequate internal reliability (α structural bias subscale = 0.92; α implicit bias subscale = 0.74).

Conclusion: This study developed and piloted the RC Bias scale to measure awareness of implicit and structural biases among child welfare practitioners. Preliminary findings suggest that a two-factor scale presents good internal reliability and validity. Future research could examine convergent and discriminant validity and use the measure to assess changes over time and in function of participation in trainings or other initiatives to address bias in child welfare.