Maltreated and Nonmaltreated Children’s Knowledge of the Juvenile Dependency Court System

Abstract

The current study examined age differences in maltreated and nonmaltreated children’s knowledge of juvenile dependency court vocabulary and proceedings. One hundred and sixty-seven children aged 4—14 years were questioned about their understanding of legal vocabulary and about the content of a story depicting a child involved in dependency court. Age-related increases emerged across all measures of children’s legal understanding. Direct experience with the dependency system was also related to the accuracy of children’s legal knowledge. Children with greater experience in the dependency system were more knowledgeable than children with no such experience, although even the oldest maltreated children with considerable dependency system experience evidenced some deficits in legal knowledge. Overall, findings suggest children and adolescents involved in dependency proceedings need help understanding some aspects of the dependency process, and this need exists regardless of whether children have been involved in cases ongoing for some time.