ScholarWorks@숙명여자대학교

초록

This study classified child deaths into types of abuse and neglect, and the characteristics of these fatalities were analyzed to understand the nature and factors of child abuse fatalities. For this purpose, 26 cases(28 children) of child abuse deaths reported during 2018 in South Korea were identified from the National Child Abuse Information System, and prosecution and court records were analyzed. The cases of familial and non-familial child abuse deaths were primarily classified as fatal assaults and fatal child neglect. Specifically, fatal assaults were classified as fatal child abuse, filicide followed by suicide, neonaticide, and psychiatric illness of the offender. The cases of neglect were classified as deprivation of basic needs, and supervisory neglect. Medical neglect was not found in these cases. Most cases were those of fatal child abuse (10 familial cases, 1 non-familial case) and the infant group was the most vulnerable to child abuse death among the child age groups. The perpetrators(parents) had several overlapping risk factors, including serious economic hardships, domestic violence and criminal records, unstable marital status and history of mental illness. In addition, compared to reports in the previous international studies, the rate of death caused by neglect (18%) in this study was very low. This finding suggests that child deaths due to neglect have not been accurately tallied in Korea. The results of this study, provide policy and practice implications for preventing and resolving child abuse and neglect.

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