Research on Child Abuse in the US Armed Forces

Child maltreatment in the United States has provoked considerable interest in recent years. Child abuse and neglect are prevalent in all parts of American society. Although children of military personnel experience maltreatment, little research has been completed which compares child abuse rates in the military with those for civilian populations. Studies that have assessed child abuse in the armed forces have been based on official reports recorded in military Family Advocacy central registries. Because a standardized method for recording child abuse does not exist, conclusions regarding the prevalence of abuse are often inaccurate. We explore this and other methodological constraints such as differences in definitions, data collection procedures, and utilization of records, which make estimating child abuse accurately in both military and civilian populations difficult. A review of the literature on child maltreatment in the services also reveals that there are many correlates of child abuse unique to the military family. Finally, we discuss both the risk and protective factors within military life that may influence the occurrence of child maltreatment.