Child supervisionSupervision is wid

Child supervision
Supervision is widely recognized as vital to protecting children from harm. Some estimates suggest that 90% of injuries to young children occur in or around their home when they are supposedly being supervised by a caregiver. Despite the beliefs that childhood injury is often related to a lack of supervision, evidence to support this premise is limited.
There have been few attempts formally to defi ne the term “supervision” in the context of injury prevention. A reasonable defi nition, consistent with existing evidence, is that supervision refers to behaviours that are related to attention (watching and listening) and to proximity (touching, or being within reach). Furthermore, these behaviours are judged by how continuous they are (whether constant, intermittent or not at all).
What some researchers are fi nding, though, is that caregivers exhibit a spectrum of patterns of supervision – ranging from almost total neglect to extreme vigilance. While there are many parallels between good parenting skills and good supervision practices, there does not seem to be any agreed-upon supervisory style that is uniformly protective. In addition, the eff ectiveness of supervision will be aff ected by whether the caregiver becomes distracted, and by the caregiver’s mental health status, use of alcohol or drugs, complacency or overconfi dence.
Models of supervision have focused on:
– the need for supervision based on a child’s age, developmental status and exposure to possible hazards;
– the supervisor’s judgement, skills and ability to infl uence the child;
– the physical proximity of the supervisor to the child, taking into account the setting and the characteristics of the child;
– the degree of verbal and physical interventions with the child;
– how much of the time the supervisor is actively supervising.
Tools are needed to measure these various constructs more accurately.
There is considerable indirect evidence that associates supervision with a child’s risk of injury. This risk increases substantially when the child lives with a single caregiver, in a home with multiple siblings, or with a substance-abusing caregiver – all of which can compromise the ability of a caregiver to attend closely to the child. In large families, supervision of younger children by older children may be common, but is usually inadequate.
Good child supervision is likely to be an important intervention to protect children from injury. However, the role of supervision and guidelines for its age-appropriate application in various settings of injury risk need further investigation. Research to improve the eff ectiveness of supervision as an injury prevention strategy should include eff orts to defi ne and measure diff erent types of supervision. Models of good supervision should be developed, and cultural infl uences on the ways supervision is conducted should be examined. Interventions to infl uence the behaviour of caregivers also need to be considered. A fi nal critical step is to evaluate diff erent supervision strategies and measure their impact on reducing injuries.