Looked after children and offending
£14.95
There have been longstanding concerns about the risk of offending for children in care. This research study investigates the characteristics and pathways of looked after children and the risk and protective factors that may reduce the risk of offending and promote resilience. It demonstrates that the care system can be effective in promoting security, resilience and pro-social values, but a range of important policy and practice issues need to be addressed to help ensure that vulnerable young people in the care and youth justice systems have a positive future.
Who is this book for?
All practitioners, managers and policy makers who are involved with looked after young people and the care and/or justice systems.
What you will find in this book
This study explores the policy, practice and research context for young people and offending, the research on risk and resilience factors, findings from a national survey and focus groups on this subject, and is illustrated by the narratives of young people in care.
It reports on the resilience factors that can be promoted to reduce the likelihood of offending; the features of the care and justice systems that may increase/reduce the likelihood of offending and the criminalisation of looked after children; the key transitional/turning points that are opportunities for interventions to divert children in care from offending; and makes recommendations for policy and practice.
Authors
Gillian Schofield is a Professor of Child and Family Social Work at the University of East Anglia. She has published widely on the welfare of looked after children.
Laura Biggart is a Lecturer in Social Science Research Methods and Psychology, with a focus on social cognition and emotional intelligence.
Emma Ward is a Senior Research Associate who has worked on a wide range of adoption, foster care and residential care research projects.
Victoria Scaife is a Senior Lecturer in Psychology, with research interests in social-cognitive models of decision-making in populations of young people.
Jane Dodsworth is a Lecturer in Social Work, with a research interest in child sexual exploitation.
Alice Haynes is a Policy and Research Analyst at the NSPCC, and has conducted research on asylum-seeking and refugee mothers in England.
Birgit Larsson is a Senior Research Associate, currently researching young women and restorative justice.
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£14.95
Reviews
Those working in the field will not be surprised by the findings presented here, but the authors have provided a coherent, well-structured and cogent piece of work that adds to the volume of voices calling for good legislative intentions to be translated into effective practice. They point to the need – if we are to take the rhetoric of joined-up policies seriously – to integrate youth justice policy with the welfarist intentions of the care system.
Ian Paylor, Lancaster University, UK, Journal of Social Work