Ithaka, N.Y. - Maltreated children do significantly worse in school and have many more discipline problems than children who are not abused or neglected, according to a new study by Cornell University researchers.
Neglected children do significantly worse academically than other children, and physically abused children have the most discipline problems. Sexually abused children, on the other hand, show no differences in academic performance or in discipline than children who are not maltreated, the study found.
"These findings show that the type of maltreatment has specific effects on behavior and scholastic performance," said John Eckenrode, Cornell professor of human development and family studies and acting director of Cornell's Family Life Development Center. He believes that the study is the most comprehensive attempt to document the impact of child abuse and neglect on academic achievement and social adjustment in the school setting.
"Neglect, which is reported in 58 percent of maltreatment cases nationally and in 90 percent of reported New York state cases, is often overlooked as a lower priority problem than physical or sexual abuse. Yet, neglect evidently has a greater long-term impact on academic achievement than other forms of maltreatment," he said.
That sexual abuse had no significant effect in school was among the most surprising findings, he said. "Sexual abuse may have profound effects in other areas of psychosocial development, yet its effects on academic achievement and adjustment in schools are not apparent from our data."
Eckenrode collaborated with Molly Laird of Quest International in Granville, Ohio, and John Doris, Cornell professor emeritus of human development and family studies and former director of the Family Life Development Center.
The researchers compared the school performance and disciplinary problems of a representative community sample of 420 abused and neglected children in grades kindergarten through 12 in Elmira, N.Y., with a matched sample in gender, school, grade level, neighborhood and, when possible, classroom of 420 non-maltreated children in the same community.
The study was published in Developmental Psychology (1993, Vol. 29, No. 1) and is reported in the fall 1993 issue of Human Ecology Forum, published at Cornell.
The researchers found that, in general, maltreated children did significantly poorer than non-maltreated peers in standardized tests and grades, were 2.5 times more likely to repeat a grade and had significantly more discipline referrals and suspensions. These findings persisted even when school, gender, number of siblings, age, place of residence and public assistance status were controlled for statistically. The effects of maltreatment did not differ for boys and girls.
Previous studies have focused on infants and preschoolers and few have looked at academic performance. Eckenrode's study is different in that it not only used a case-control approach with a large sample but also looked at the long-term effects of the different types of maltreatment.
"There is a tendency to put less emphasis on chronic problems, such as neglect, because they may not represent an immediate physical danger to the child. From a developmental perspective, however, chronic neglect evidently does as much damage as abuse," Eckenrode points out. "By influencing academic performance which is linked to success in the work world, neglect puts a child's whole future at risk."