About CATS

CATS brings together expertise from the Lifespan Research Group, Health and Social Care Department, Royal Holloway, University of London and the Department of Criminology and Sociology at Kingston University. The Centre is led by Professor Antonia Bifulco (RHUL) and Professor Julia Davidson (KU). Centre directors have conducted a considerable amount of research, teaching and practitioner training on abuse issues, around offenders, victims, criminal justice and social services practitioners. This includes experience of physical abuse/domestic violence; psychological abuse and sexual abuse/sexual assaults in children, adolescents and adults. The Centre focuses upon high quality assessment and increased understanding of models around psychosocial causal factors accounting for victim vulnerability and perpetrator actions. It utilises a lifespan perspective in examining early life abuse and its impact on child, adolescent, adult and older age behaviour in both further victimisation and perpetration of abuse. Centre members retain a strong interest in government policy and legislative provision for both perpetrators and victims of abuse. The Centre aims to be a focus of expertise on issues related to abuse, whether in its investigation and research, its teaching and training to professionals or knowledge dissemination to related professions and the community.

The two universities provide complementary areas of expertise, and have a wide range of networks and professional contacts to further the activities of the centre. Their collaboration was initiated as part of the WestFocus Social Inclusion network. This provided funds for undertaking knowledge exchange in a consortium of seven universities in the West of London in relation to a range of social inclusion issues. In terms of the developing centre it funded joint work on child victims of sexual abuse in the police system and training for social workers in child abuse and attachment issues. The former was in response to a Metropolitan Police Child Abuse Investigation Command request to explore police and social work practice with young victims of sexual abuse and the effectiveness of inter-agency collaboration, investigative ABE (achieving best evidence) training of police officers and provision for women post release from custody.  The evaluative research undertaken led to both to reports for the police* and a publication** and to funding from the Metropolitan Police for further research work. The training for social workers in interview assessment methods is based on grants from voluntary and statutory agencies to aid in best practice in child and family services. The success of this collaboration has led to the decision to create the centre from the two universities.

In addition to its directors, CATS is able to draw on a very wide range of expertise from the members of its Advisory Group.

* Davidson and Bifulco (2006) Placing Children and Young People at the Centre of Police Practice: Consulting Young Victims of Intra-Familial Sexual Abuse. Report 1 – Literature review; Report 2 – Practice.    

**Davidson J, Bifulco A, Thomas G & Ramsay M (2006). Child victims of sexual abuse: Children’s experience of the investigative process in the criminal justice system. Journal of Practice,18¨247-263 

CATS directors:

Professor Antonia Bifulco The Lifespan Research Group directed by Toni Bifulco, has a long history of researching abuse victimisation in the family context, and its effect on mental health in the immediate and longer term. Research programme funding over 10 years from the Medical Research Council allowed for intensive interview investigation of the causal effects of early life neglect and abuse on later experience and psychological disorder in women and intergenerationally. The research has been published widely in international peer reviewed journals and a book co-authored with Patricia Moran, ‘Wednesday’s Child’ (1998) is still a primary text for students and researchers in the area of long terms effect of childhood neglect and abuse.  The Childhood Experience of Care and Abuse (CECA) interview was developed by Toni Bifulco as a standardised interview tool for collecting information on abuse in early life. This is increasingly used by practitioners in forensic, social work and psychological fields.

Professor Julia Davidson Julia Davidson is newly appointed Professor in Criminology and Sociology At Kingston University, having previously been at University of Westminster. She has conducted a considerable amount of research in the criminal justice area, her PhD explored the effectiveness of psychiatric treatment programmes for convicted child sexual abusers. Julia Davidson has extensive experience of applied research and has directed and conducted work with young victims, serious violent and sexual offenders, criminal justice practitioners and sentencers. She has acted as a reviewer for the Department of Health and National Institute for Mental Health Victims of Violence and Abuse Prevention Programme (VVAPP). She has recently published a book ‘Child Sexual Abuse, Media Representation and Government Rections’. She has experience of regular media contact and provides expert advice on criminal justice issues to the media.

CATS Advisory Group

(alphabetical)

Vittoria Ardino (Senior Lecturer, Criminal Psychology, London Metropolitan University; leader of task force on trauma ESTSS (European Task Force for Traumatic Stress Studies) (www.estss.org)

John Azah (Kingston Race and Equality Council) 

Richard Bentall (Psychology Professor, Bangor University)

Arnon Bentovim (Forensic Psychiatrist, Trustee Lucy Faithful Foundation, Consultant to SWAAY, co-director Child and Family Training (www.childandfamilytraining.org.uk)

Maggie Brennan (Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre - CEOP)

John Carr (Chair of Children's Coalition on Internet Safety - CHIS)

Julian Dunn (Social Worker, Head of Therapy at SWAAY, Rehabilitating Abused Abusers www.swaay.co.uk)

Rachel Edwards (Forensic Psychologist, SWAAY, Rehabilitating Abused Abusers, (www.swaay.co.uk)

Hilary Eldridge (Chief Executive, Lucy Faithfull Foundation: working to protect children  (www.lucyfaithfull.org)

David Foreman (Consultant Psychiatrist CAMHS, Isle of Man; Visiting Professor, Department of Health and Social Care, Royal Holloway University of London)

Alisdair Gillespie (Barrister & Reader in Criminal Law, Leicester De Montfort Law School - De Montfort University)

Ron Giddens (Director of Operations' St Christopher's Fellowship www.stchris.org.uk)

Anna Gupta (Senior Lecturer in Social work & Child Guardian, Royal Holloway, University of London)

Christopher Hamerton (Lawyer & Senior Academic in Socio-legal Studies, University of Westminster)

Adele Jones (Professor of Childhood Studies, Director of The Centre for Applied Childhood Studies, University of Huddersfield)

Shy Keenan ('The Phoenix Chief Advocates' – advocate group for child sexual abuse victims and support for families of children murdered by child molesters www.tpcauk.com)

Gill Mezey (consultant Forensic Psychiatrist, Reader at St George's University of London)

Liza Bingley Miller (Social Work Consultant and Director of Child and Family Training (www.childandfamilytraining.org.uk)

Carol Kinley-Smith (MAPPA lead for Metropolitan Police)

Paula Nicolson (Professor of Health Psychology, RHUL)

Gordon Parker (Head of Children's Services (UK), St Christopher’s Fellowship – housing association & children's charity providing residential and foster care. www.stchris.org.uk)

Betsy Stanko (Professor of Criminology, RHUL and Metropolitan Police Senior advisor)

Peter Spindler (Commander Metropolitan police)

Geraldine Thomas (Research Psychologist, RHUL and Child Therapist, NHS)

Stephen Webster (Forensic Research Psychologist at National Centre for Social Research (www.natcen.ac.uk)

International

Vincenzo Caretti (Professor of Developmental Psychopathology, University of Palermo, Sicily and Dynamic Psychology, University of La Sapienza, Rome)

Petter Gottschalk (Professor of Information Technology and Knowledge, Management at the Norwegian School of Management and a lecturer and supervisor at the Norwegian Police University College)

Thierry Pham (Professor of Forensic Psychology University of Mons-Hainaut, Belgium and Director of Centre of Research in Social Defense, Tournai, Belgium)

Ruth Pat Horencyk & Danny Brom (Psychologists, CHERISH Centre for Treatment of Psychotrauma, Herzog Hospital, Jerusalem (www.projectcherish.org).

 

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June 2009