Poster #86 - Implicit Bias in the Child Welfare System: Placement Decisions for White Children vs. Black Children

• In Event: Poster Session 19

Abstract

In the United States, there are a disproportionate amount of children of color involved in the child welfare system (Ganasarajah, Siegel, & Sickmund, 2017). There are two theories as to why this occurs. The first is that since people of color are more likely to be in a lower socioeconomic bracket which is correlated with more abuse happening in the household, in turn more children of color are placed out of the home. The second theory is that more children of color are placed out of the home due to explicit and implicit bias against people of color (Dettlaff, 2014). The current study explores whether implicit bias could be one of the reasons why children of color, particularly Black children, are more likely to be placed into the child welfare system in the United States. This will be explored by looking at children in the welfare system who were placed out of the home for behavioral problems which is not clearly defined in the AFCARS data set making it most likely to fall prey to implicit bias. The AFCARS data set was used to explore this question which is a data set that includes demographic data on children involved in the United States child welfare system. The current data set includes 631,893 children involved in the child welfare system in the United States and the sample from that population will be determined after the matching process is complete. The participants in the sample will be analyzed using a matched pair analysis where participants are matched on their state, types of neglect, reason for referral, age and gender. The only difference between the two matched participants would then be their race, either White identifying race or Black identifying race. Outcomes that will be examined to see if there are differences between the subjects are the child’s current placement setting, if their parents’ rights have been terminated, what their most recent case plan goal was, and the amount of time in the foster care system. If there was implicit bias in the child welfare system, one would expect that Black children, particularly Black boys, would be more likely than the White child in this matched pair analysis to be placed in a higher level of care, have their parental rights terminated, not have reunification be a part of their case plan, and spend more time in the foster care system.

Author

• Rachel Alexis Dooley, Tufts University
  Presenting Author