Parental experience of child protection intervention

This study examined ways parents experience and make sense of child protection intervention. The purpose of this study was threefold. First, to develop a model representing the ways parents experience intervention with the potential to help workers in their efforts to protect children and work with families. Second, to provide an opportunity for parents to speak about what it is like being on the receiving end of intervention. Finally, to set the stage for a dialogue between parents and child protection services about constructive ways of working together.;Using a constructivist paradigm and a grounded theory approach, in-depth qualitative interviews with eighteen parents took place. Parents' perception of the ways child protection serviced utilised power emerged as the primary factor shaping parents' understanding of intervention and their responses to it. Two ways of perceiving power emerged from data; parents perceived workers using power-over them or power with-them. Three ways of responding to intervention emerged in data; fighting workers through openly challenging and opposing them in court, "playing the game" by feigning co-operation, and working with them in what appeared to be genuine and collaborative relationships. Parental responses to intervention tended to hinge on the ways they perceived power being used by workers. Parents perceiving power to be used over them tended to fight or play the game, while parents experiencing power being used with them tended to work with intervention but also still spoke of "playing the game." The study presents a model that represents the above parental perceptions and responses and traces them from the initiation of service through to parental views of service outcomes.