First Advisor
Adam Chamberlain
Abstract
Cases of emotional abuse involving children have been previously associated with long lasting physical and psychological issues among those who experience it. Previous research has linked the significant underreporting of emotional abuse cases with the use of vague and unclear definitions of emotional abuse as it involves minors. Creating a concise and inclusive definition has proven to be difficult because of a lack of physical evidence to support claims, thus each of the 50 US states has a different definition for what constitutes emotional abuse. Why do definitions vary in the first place? Here, I hypothesize that states with more interest groups focused on child welfare will have clearer and stricter definitions of emotional abuse. Using counts of these interest groups in each of the 50 states, I find no statistical connection between the number of interest groups in a state and a more inclusive legal definition of child emotional abuse. Other factors such as state income and political ideology also cannot explain these differences. Given the results, questions surrounding the necessity of a federal definition have been proposed but left unexplored for future research.
Recommended Citation
Banning, Alexandria
(2024)
"The Inclusivity of Emotional Abuse Definitions and Interest Groups,"
Bridges: A Journal of Student Research: Vol. 14:
Iss.
14, Article 3.
Available at:
https://digitalcommons.coastal.edu/bridges/vol14/iss14/3
