FAM7.B Child maltreatment: Percentage of substantiated maltreatment of children ages 0–17 by maltreatment type and age, 2020

excel icon FAM7B Excel Table

Characteristic Physical abuse Neglect Medical neglect Sexual abuse Sex trafficking Psychological abuse Other abuse Unknown
Overall 16.5 76.1 2.0 9.4 0.2 6.4 6.0 0.0
Age
Ages 0–3 15.4 84.2 1.9 1.2 0.0 4.5 6.0 0.0
Age < 1 17.9 83.4 1.9 0.4 0.0 3.1 5.7 0.0
Ages 1–3 13.5 84.9 1.9 1.9 0.0 5.6 6.2 0.0
Ages 4–7 15.2 78.7 1.7 7.1 0.0 6.8 6.3 0.0
Ages 8–11 16.3 73.3 1.9 12.0 0.1 8.0 6.2 0.0
Ages 12–15 18.9 64.7 2.4 21.0 0.4 7.8 5.5 0.0
Ages 16–17 20.9 61.6 2.5 22.6 1.1 7.0 5.5 0.0
Age unknown or missing 20.6 65.8 1.1 14.4 0.2 5.0 5.7 0.0
NOTE: Based on data from 50 states, the District of Columbia, and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. The data in this table are rates of victimization based on the number of investigations and assessments by Child Protective Services that found the child to be a victim of one or more types of maltreatment. This is a duplicated count of maltreatments, based on a unique count of victims. This is a change from years prior to the America's Children, 2017 edition when a child was counted each time the child was determined to be a victim. Rows total to more than 100% because a single child may be the victim of multiple kinds of maltreatment. Substantiated maltreatment includes the dispositions of substantiated or indicated. This is a change from estimates prior to America's Children, 2017, which included alternative response victims as maltreated. States vary in their definition of abuse and neglect. The category of unknown includes unborn, missing data, and children older than age 17. Additional technical notes are available in the annual reports titled Child Maltreatment. These reports are available at https://www.acf.hhs.gov/cb/data-research/child-maltreatment. The Justice for Victims of Trafficking Act of 2015 included an amendment to the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act under Title VIII—Better Response for Victims of Child Sex Trafficking by adding a requirement to collect and report sex trafficking data. States began reporting the new maltreatment type to the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS) with their Federal fiscal year 2018 data submissions. For 2020, 35 states submitted data about victims of sex trafficking to NCANDS.
SOURCE: Administration for Children and Families, National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System.

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