Examining the role of child welfare worker characteristics and the substantiation decision

Background: The role of child welfare workers is twofold, to promote the safety of children and youth and to address their wellbeing. This provincially legislated mandate requires child welfare workers to make decisions across the child welfare service continuum. After a report of child maltreatment is investigated, workers are required to assess the veracity of the allegation through the substantiation decision and to determine whether the child has been victimized, which may impact on families' future involvement with services. Little is known whether or how individual worker characteristics impact the substantiation decision. Objective and methods: This study estimated the degree of variation across caseworker characteristics in the substantiation decision through secondary data analysis of the Ontario Incidence Study of Reported Child Abuse and Neglect (OIS, 2018). We explored how the substantiation decision varied across clinical and caseworker characteristics, using both simple and multilevel logistic regression models. Results: Findings suggest that primarily clinical characteristics predicted the substantiation decision, however, worker years of child welfare experience also predicted substantiation, such that more experienced workers were significantly more likely to substantiate than less experienced workers (est = 0.02, SE = 0.01, p < .10). The Intraclass Correlation Coefficient (35 %) suggests differences among child welfare workers' substantiation decision, they are however, characteristics not measured in this study. Conclusions: Further research to assess the differential nature of child welfare worker characteristics and their role in decision-making is required.