TY - JOUR
T1 - Children's services for the digital age
T2 - A qualitative study into current procedures and online risks among service users
AU - El-Asam, Aiman
AU - Katz, Adrienne
AU - Street, Cathy
AU - Nazar, Nijina M.
AU - Livanou, Maria
N1 - Funding Information:
The publication process of this article has received financial support from the Nurture Network (eNurture) funded by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), their support is gratefully acknowledged ( Research Council Grant Ref: ES/S004467/1 ). This article is part of a project titled “Vulnerability, Online Lives and Mental Health: Towards a New Practice Model”. Any views expressed here are those of the project investigators and do not necessarily represent the views of eNurture or UKRI.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 Elsevier Ltd
PY - 2021/3
Y1 - 2021/3
N2 - Background: Local government public sector children's services working with vulnerable children in England are faced with challenging cases involving potentially harmful digital/online risks. All services have a duty to safeguard. Educators and key professionals in children's services such as in social care, mental health, youth justice, voluntary sector advice centres or policing may be involved. Yet little is known about how these services identify, assess, refer and respond to such cases. Aim: This study aims to explore how local services working with children and young people, including social care, health and the police, address cases with digital components among children and adolescents and how equipped they are to do so. Methods: Using semi-structured interviews, this study interviewed 14 participants within 10 services such as mental health, social care, youth justice, teenage pregnancy prevention, voluntary sector online youth counselling, school nursing and children's education inspection and safeguarding services. Interviews were transcribed and thematically analysed. Results: A narrowly focused awareness of online risk was noticed among all participants, reflecting an emphasis on a singular target (e.g. Child Sexual Exploitation - CSE). This led frontline staff to omit exploration of wider online risks or antecedents of grooming. The outcome therefore was a lack of data on harms other than CSE or sharing of explicit images, and limited knowledge of a wider range of fast changing risks to children, which could inform prevention. Assessment tools seemed generic and focus heavily on CSE or social media; some omitted online risk unless safeguarding issues were raised. Furthermore, multi-agency collaboration was hampered by simplistic or no referral mechanisms for evidence involving online risks. Finally, it was also apparent that there is a lack of structured and mandatory training programmes around online risk and children and young people's digital lives. Conclusion: Online risks need careful consideration within children's services’ cases and to be more systematically embedded within practice. The findings are crucial in guiding services towards modernising their methods, advancing their training and assessment tools to enhance multi-agency collaboration in cases involving vulnerable children.
AB - Background: Local government public sector children's services working with vulnerable children in England are faced with challenging cases involving potentially harmful digital/online risks. All services have a duty to safeguard. Educators and key professionals in children's services such as in social care, mental health, youth justice, voluntary sector advice centres or policing may be involved. Yet little is known about how these services identify, assess, refer and respond to such cases. Aim: This study aims to explore how local services working with children and young people, including social care, health and the police, address cases with digital components among children and adolescents and how equipped they are to do so. Methods: Using semi-structured interviews, this study interviewed 14 participants within 10 services such as mental health, social care, youth justice, teenage pregnancy prevention, voluntary sector online youth counselling, school nursing and children's education inspection and safeguarding services. Interviews were transcribed and thematically analysed. Results: A narrowly focused awareness of online risk was noticed among all participants, reflecting an emphasis on a singular target (e.g. Child Sexual Exploitation - CSE). This led frontline staff to omit exploration of wider online risks or antecedents of grooming. The outcome therefore was a lack of data on harms other than CSE or sharing of explicit images, and limited knowledge of a wider range of fast changing risks to children, which could inform prevention. Assessment tools seemed generic and focus heavily on CSE or social media; some omitted online risk unless safeguarding issues were raised. Furthermore, multi-agency collaboration was hampered by simplistic or no referral mechanisms for evidence involving online risks. Finally, it was also apparent that there is a lack of structured and mandatory training programmes around online risk and children and young people's digital lives. Conclusion: Online risks need careful consideration within children's services’ cases and to be more systematically embedded within practice. The findings are crucial in guiding services towards modernising their methods, advancing their training and assessment tools to enhance multi-agency collaboration in cases involving vulnerable children.
KW - Children's Services
KW - Online Risk
KW - Online Safety
KW - Vulnerable Young People
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85100144143&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.childyouth.2020.105872
DO - 10.1016/j.childyouth.2020.105872
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85100144143
SN - 0190-7409
VL - 122
JO - Children and Youth Services Review
JF - Children and Youth Services Review
M1 - 105872
ER -
