Police response to violence and conflict between parents and their minor children.

Purpose: This study examines the nature of all domestic violence incidents involving parents and their minor children to which police in Philadelphia responded during the 2013 calendar year.

Method: We use a retrospective design to explore the nature and outcome of parent-child incidents to which police are summoned. Incidents that officers determined met the state statute definition of child abuse are not included.

Results: Of 54,456 domestic violence incidents in the city of Philadelphia in 2013, 2,361 involved a verbal incident or physical altercation between a minor child and at least one parent. Most reports (83.3%) identified the child as the offender and were for verbal incidents (89.6%), suggesting police were called to resolve conflict in the home. When a child was the offender, boys were the most common offenders and mothers the most common victims. When a parent was the offender, mothers were the most common offenders and daughters the most common victims. Parent-offender incidents were far fewer (16.7%) but more likely than child-offender incidents to involve physical violence (AOR=6.19) and to result in arrest (AOR=3.67).

Conclusions: Parent-child incidents that are not child abuse constitute about 20% of all domestic violence incidents to which police are summoned. Parent-child incidents are an under-researched and perhaps under-served issue. We know of few resources beyond law enforcement for on-the-scene crisis intervention and, as such, officers appear to serve as mediators in these mostly verbal disagreements. The appropriateness and cost of such intervention merits investigation and discussion.