The effect of child protection attitudes on child protection decision-making: The mediating role of person perceptions

Previous research has shown that professionals’ child protection attitudes influence their decision-making. This study investigates whether these attitudes are associated with person perceptions that professionals form about parents who may be perpetrators of child maltreatment (e.g. perceptions of the perpetrator’s sociability, competence, and morality) and whether they mediate the decision to provide a supervision order. A vignette study was conducted among 133 child protection workers. The estimated structural equation model (SEM) showed that child protection attitudes had an impact on person perceptions that were formed about the perpetrator of child maltreatment (perceived competence and morality). Workers were less likely to support a supervision order when they perceived the perpetrator as more moral. The analysis did not reveal a direct relationship between child protection attitudes and decision-making, while the indirect effect was significant, suggesting that person perceptions on morality mediated the relationship between child protection attitudes and decision-making. The results of this analysis help to confirm and deepen our understanding of the role that individual decision-makers play in decisional variability in the child protection context with implications for staff selection and staff development.