Children dually involved with statutory child protection and juvenile justice in Australia: A developmental cascade framework

Children who experience dual involvement by child protection and juvenile justice statutory systems have poorer life outcomes attributable to higher levels of disadvantage and more complex needs compared to single system involved children. Literature regarding dual involved children in high income, western, and democratic nations are largely based on US studies. Whilst child protection and juvenile justice systems across the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia have somewhat similar legislative systems, cohort outcomes and relationships between risk factors and offending trajectories for dual involved children are influenced by differing legislative, geographic, and demographic contexts. Compared to international literature, significant gaps exist regarding the Australian context. Further, within Australia, there are no evaluated specific responses and/or strategies directed towards supporting this highly vulnerable cohort towards increased long-term positive outcomes. This is the first comprehensive review of Australian studies that examines the characteristics of children who have had dual involvement with juvenile justice and child protection agencies within Australia. Using a thematic analysis twenty-five studies with dual involved samples were analysed, examining the individual, familial, environmental, and systemic factors that contribute to the likelihood of children becoming involved in both child protection and juvenile justice systems within Australia. Six thematic factors emerged that characterised the trajectories of dual involved children: cumulative and destabilising adversity; maltreatment timing and type; offending onset and context; educational disadvantage and disengagement; co-occurring challenges; and First Nations overrepresentation. Our findings are applied to Developmental Systems Theory, extending on previous literature to depict an Australian first developmental cascade framework illustrating the context specific pathways of dual involved children and opportunities for intervention in Australia. The discussion highlights and compares differences between Australian and international contexts with the intention of emphasising key areas for future research, and policy and practice reform. This is important because of the nuanced differences between dual involved characteristics across different legislative and geographic contexts, with particular relevance to the experiences of First Nations children and families. Future research, policy and practice would benefit from continued reforms that focus resources on co-ordinated system responses and cohort specific services; namely, culturally appropriate diversion strategies that promote behavioural de-escalation and educational engagement.