Despite a history of critique, concentrated discussion and improved assessment processes, neglect continues to be a major challenge for child protection services. This paper draws on findings from a government-commissioned analysis of ‘serious case reviews’ (SCRs) in England, arising from incidents of serious child abuse in 2017–2019. There were 235 cases, for which 166 final reports were available. Alongside a quantitative analysis of the whole cohort, we undertook an in-depth qualitative analysis of 12 cases involving neglect. A key challenge in responding to neglect in its different forms is that it can be so widespread amongst families that practitioners no longer notice its severity or chronicity – it becomes normalised. In this paper we explore two dimensions of the ‘paradox of neglect’ where it seems to be everywhere and nowhere simultaneously. The first is that neglect is so closely bound up with the prevalence of poverty that little action is taken to address it. The second is that the overwhelming nature of neglect can blind practitioners to other forms of maltreatment that may also be present within a family. Practitioners, now more than ever, need to recognise the dimensions of this paradox to protect children from neglect.

中文翻译：

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应对“忽视正常化”：英国儿童保护审查的信息

尽管一直以来都存在批评、集中讨论和改进的评估流程，但忽视仍然是儿童保护服务面临的主要挑战。本文借鉴了政府委托对英国 2017-2019 年严重虐待儿童事件进行的“严重案件审查”(SCR) 分析的结果。共有 235 起案件，有 166 份最终报告。除了对整个队列进行定量分析外，我们还对 12 个涉及忽视的案例进行了深入的定性分析。应对不同形式的忽视的一个关键挑战是，它在家庭中如此普遍，以至于从业者不再注意到它的严重性或长期性——它变得常态化。在本文中，我们探讨了“忽视悖论”的两个维度，它似乎同时无处不在又无处不在。首先，忽视与贫困的普遍存在密切相关，以至于几乎没有采取任何行动来解决这个问题。其次，忽视的压倒性性质可能会使从业者忽视家庭中也可能存在的其他形式的虐待行为。从业者现在比以往任何时候都更需要认识到这一悖论的严重性，以保护儿童免受忽视。