Local People's Perceptions of Community Protective Factors That Protect from Child Maltreatment

Background and Purpose: Child abuse is preventable when community has a strong sense of protectiveness against child abuse and neglect, especially when community has good support systems for children in difficult circumstances. The current study aimed to examine and understand local people’s perceptions about community protective factors that protect children against child maltreatment. To do that the researchers defined the distributions of perceived community protective factors including adequate formal and informal supports, accessibility of childcare and kindergarten, family’s support that protect children from child maltreatment and explored community people’s rationale for selecting some factors as protective factors.

Methods: The researchers used a mixed method with the explanatory sequential design and collected primary quantitative and qualitative data collected via questionnaire from community members (N=200) and interviews with key informants (N=20) from the selected two districts of Ulaanbaatar, capital city of Mongolia. In terms of data analysis, descriptive statistics and non-parametric tests by SPSS were used for the analysis of quantitative data and thematic data analysis based on selections of common themes were used for the analysis of qualitative data. Ethical approval was obtained from the IRB located in the School of Sciences and Arts, NUM.

Results: Most of the participants informed that they do not receive any support or limited supports from neighbourhood-based business, non-profit and religious agencies and volunteer groups. In contrast, the participants informed that they often receive supports from parents and siblings. Participants of the interviews inform that they also feel unsafe and reluctant to send their school age and small children alone without parents/caregivers. Qualitative data of individual interviews support the quantitative findings of people’s weak/no connection with neighbors and neighborhood-based organizations and volunteer groups.

Conclusions and Implications: Local people often approach to family supports such as parents and siblings to get support and assistance in upbringing own children and do not and seldom approach to the neighborhood based private and volunteer agencies and volunteer groups. The qualitiative and quantiative findings indicate that the perceived safety and collaboration of and with the own neighborhood are very low due to lack of information and supports from mutual parts. The study informs that a comprehensive study involving more local people and community organizations is needed to look at a full picture of the community support system. In addition, the researchers recommend that more involvement and collaboration between different stakeholders are needed to improve community based prevention and interventions against child maltreatment.

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