Families in Society: The Journal of Contemporary Social Services | www.FamiliesInSociety.org | DOI: 10.1606/1044-3894.3871 ©2009 Alliance for Children and Families 176 AT-RISK FAMILIES Distinguishing Maltreating Versus Nonmaltreating At-Risk Families: Implications for Foster Care and Early Childhood Education Interventions Stephanie M. Curenton, Lenore M. McWey, & Melissa G. Bolen Discriminant function (DF) analysis was used to distinguish 92 ethnically and socioeconomically diverse maltreating versus nonmaltreating families on indicators of socioeconomic status (SES) and parenting stress. Families included those with sub- stantiated reports of child maltreatment (n = 23), plus Head Start families (n = 36), and child care families (n = 33) without reports of maltreatment. The significant SES distinguishers were poverty and parental education and employment. The signifi- cant parenting stress distinguishers were parental self-reports of a dysfunctional parent–child relationship and difficult child temperament. Maltreating and Head Start families were similar in terms of poverty, but only the maltreating families had clini- cal levels of parenting stress. Implications for family therapy and early childhood education interventions are discussed. ABSTRACT C hild maltreatment is a social problem with which practitioners, policy makers, advocates, and researchers have grappled for decades. In 2000, approximately 5 million children were referred to child protective services agencies for suspected maltreatment (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2005). One of the most well-researched family demographic variables associated with mal- treatment is poverty. For the past 2 decades, researchers have found that children from low-income families and low-income neighborhoods are more likely to be victims of child maltreatment (Coulton, Korbin, & Chow, 1995; Garbarino & Kostelny, 1992; Garbarino & Sherman, 1980; Pelton, 1978; Waldfogel, 2000). Even after controlling for other factors, poverty-stricken families are more likely to have substantiated cases of child maltreatment than are nonpoor families (Lee & George, 1999). However, not all parents who live in poverty maltreat their children, and not all families with substantiated cases of maltreatment live in economic deprivation. Waldfogel’s (2000) explanation for the strong and repeated correlation between low socioeconomic status (SES) and substantiated cases of child maltreatment is that the stress associated with living in poverty may lead to harsh parenting practices. More research needs to be conducted examining how psychosocial factors, such as parenting stress, are related to child maltreatment (see DiLauro, 2004) because Martin, Peterson, and Glisson (1998) have found that psychosocial factors are often overlooked by case workers in child protective agencies. Given that low SES status and parenting stress are so heavily inter- twined, it is important to understand how the degree and severity of SES and psychosocial risk factors, such as parenting stress, relate to incidences of child maltreatment. The purpose of this study was to investigate which features of parenting stress and SES status signifi- cantly differentiate maltreating from nonmaltreating families. Literature Review In the child maltreatment literature, researchers have traditionally examined parenting stress in two distinct ways. Crnic and Greenberg (1990) conceptualize parenting stress as the frequency of daily hassles encountered in life—which could be considered general stress. On the other hand, Abidin (1992) conceptualizes parenting stress as the emo- tional strain felt with the parenting role. In the present study, we chose to conceptualize stress as distinct from the general stress associated with daily hassles because we were interested in the stress associated specifically with the role of parenting. Parenting stress has long been linked to child maltreatment (e.g., Black et al., 2001; DiLauro, 2004; Huebner, 2002; Sprang, Clark, & Bass, 2005). However, a certain level of stress associated with the parenting role is normative (see Abidin, 1992). Thus, a range of stress levels may be experienced by all parents regardless of their risk for maltreatment. Researchers suggest that mothers who report high levels of parenting stress are more likely to abuse and/or neglect their children (Mash & Johnston, 1990; Rodriguez & Green, 1997). Abusive parents tend to be characterized as having increased symptoms of stress specifically related to parenting (Haskett, Smith Scott, Grant, Ward, & Robinson, 2003). Furthermore, different types of parental stress have distinguished between parents who physically abuse versus neglect their children. For instance, parents who were neglectful were more likely to have high scores on aspects of parenting stress, such as lack of confidence with the parenting role and/or lack of emotional attachment to their child, than were parents who physically abused their child (DiLauro, 2004). Addi- tionally, parents who were exposed to multiple interpersonal stressors, like domestic violence, were more likely to abuse their children than were groups of nonabusing parents (DiLauro, 2004). Overall, parenting stress has been strongly and consistently associated with negative out- comes for children (Creasy & Jarvis, 1994; Crnic & Low, 2002) because stressed parents are more likely to engage in harsh parenting practices (Webster-Stratton, 1990). Research indicates that declines in family economic resources are associated with increased levels of parental stress (McDowell, Saylor, & Taylor, 1995). Numerous studies demonstrate higher levels of parent- ing stress for low-income families (Cain & Combs-Orme, 2005; Chang,