User:Thatchick/sandbox

Child abuse in Step Families

A common villain of classic fairy tales is the abusive step mother. She mistreats her non-biological child by locking them away, or trying to kill them in some cases, and treats her own children very well if she has any. In popular culture phrases like "I'll beat you like a red-headed step child" are uttered as a common threat that show just how aware people are about the assumed nature of step family abuse. The thought is that because this child is not the biological child they are more likely to be beaten due to a lack of kinship ties. The research on this topic shows that this issue is not so clearly defined however. The image of the wicked step mother is well known but much of the research available shows more of the abuse coming from stepfathers rather than step mothers.

Step fathers have been shown to abuse female step children more than males. They are also shown to be more abusive towards female children than biological families, but less abusive than adoptive fathers. The abuse studied with men in mind tends to focus on physical or sexual abuse of children rather than emotional abuse. Neglect is also discussed as a qualifying method of child abuse by step parents in general. In 2004 a U.S. study by Weekes and Weekes-Shackelford found that while biological fathers fatally abuse children 5 and under at a rate of 5.6 per million per year step fathers were found to a have a rate of 55.9 per million per year. A U.K. study done in 2000 had different results which found that many less children responded as being abused by a step parent. Economic factors could also play a role in the abuse of step children. In places with higher levels of social strain abuse my be more prevalent or more violent. Other studies of census data and child neglect and abuse records have found that step parents may be over represented in abuse figures. They found that when the data is balanced, the biological parents have a much higher rate of abuse than the step parents do.

Step mothers are thought to be less violent in their abuse and instead rely mainly on verbal and emotion abuse.

There is little research in the field of parental abuse by children in concern with step children abusing step parents. Step sibling abuse is also under-researched.