Children, Young People & Violence: More Than Witnesses

The phrase witnessing domestic violence can make a child sound like a bystander observing something happening between adults.

Children are often much more involved than that.

A child does not have to see an assault for violence to affect them.

Living with fear can itself become part of their experience.

Children do not always have the language, confidence or opportunity to explain what is happening.

Sometimes behaviour communicates what words cannot.

A child who becomes angry, withdrawn, hyper-alert, disruptive, unusually compliant, anxious or unable to concentrate may be responding to circumstances adults cannot see.

Behaviour should not automatically be treated as defiance when it may be signalling fear, stress, confusion or survival.

The more useful question may be:

What might this child be responding to?

None of these behaviours proves that violence or abuse is occurring.

They may have many causes.

What matters is noticing significant changes, considering the child's circumstances and creating opportunities for them to be heard.

Children living with violence may learn ways of behaving that help them survive their environment.

A child may become extremely quiet because being noticed feels dangerous.

Another may constantly watch adults' expressions and voices because recognising a change in mood helps them anticipate what might happen next.

A child may lie about what happened because they are frightened of the consequences of telling the truth.

Another may become aggressive because aggression has become part of what they understand relationships to look like.

These responses should not be confused with character flaws.

Understanding the context behind behaviour can change how adults respond.

Coercive control does not only affect the adult being targeted.

Children may live within the same rules, surveillance, intimidation and restrictions.

Children may learn that keeping the abusive person calm is everyone's responsibility.

It is not.

Responsibility for abusive behaviour always belongs with the person choosing to use it.

Abuse can affect parenting in ways outsiders may misunderstand.

A parent experiencing violence may be exhausted, frightened, financially controlled, isolated or constantly managing risk.

The person using violence may deliberately undermine their parenting, contradict rules, ridicule them in front of the children or make the children believe the protective parent is responsible for the family's difficulties.

This can place enormous strain on the parent-child relationship.

Support should recognise what the parent and child have survived rather than automatically blaming the protective parent for the environment created by someone else's abuse.

Holding the person experiencing violence responsible for preventing every impact on their children can repeat the dynamics of blame already operating within an abusive relationship.

Adults and systems should ask:

Who is creating the fear, instability or danger?

Accountability should remain with the person choosing to use violence.

Growing up around violence can affect many areas of a child's life.

Depending on their circumstances, children may experience difficulties with:

These effects are not inevitable or permanent.

Children's experiences are different, and supportive relationships and safe environments can make an important difference.

A child may arrive at school after a night of conflict, police involvement, disrupted sleep or fear about what will happen when they return home.

They may have moved house suddenly, lost access to belongings, missed school or be worried about a parent or sibling.

What looks like poor concentration, lateness, absenteeism, aggression or disengagement may have a much bigger story behind it.

Schools can play an important role when they respond with curiosity, consistency and safety rather than punishment alone.

Education should go well beyond stranger danger.

Young people need age-appropriate conversations about:

Young people are already navigating relationships both online and offline.

Giving them language to recognise unsafe behaviour can make it easier to identify when something is wrong.

Relationship abuse is not limited to adults.

A young person may experience a partner who:

Control is not care.

Jealousy is not proof of love.

Pressure is not consent.

Phones, social media, gaming platforms and location-sharing technology can be used to connect young people — but they can also be used to monitor, threaten, embarrass or control them.

Technology-facilitated abuse may include:

Young people deserve privacy and boundaries online as well as offline.

Sexual abuse can be perpetrated by adults or other young people.

The person responsible may be known, trusted or loved by the child.

Children may delay disclosure or never disclose at all because of fear, shame, confusion, threats, loyalty, grooming or concern about what will happen to their family.

Adults should not assume that a child will immediately recognise abusive behaviour, resist it or have the words to describe what happened.

A child is never responsible for an adult's sexual behaviour towards them.

Children and young people do not always disclose abuse in one clear conversation.

A hesitant, partial or delayed disclosure does not mean the experience was unimportant or untrue.

How an adult responds can affect whether the child feels safe enough to continue speaking.

Children and young people may stay silent because they:

Adults should never make protection dependent on a child being able to tell a perfect, complete story.

Children should not have to become investigators of their own abuse.

They should not have to collect evidence, remember every detail in order, convince adults that they are frightened or repeatedly disclose traumatic experiences to different services before action is taken.

Adults and systems have a responsibility to:

A child may come into contact with schools, healthcare services, police, courts, child protection, housing services, family violence organisations and other agencies.

Each may see only one piece of what is happening.

One service notices anxiety.

Another sees school absence.

Another records a threat.

Another knows about stalking.

Another knows that the family has repeatedly moved.

When those pieces remain disconnected, the wider pattern can be missed.

Children's safety improves when systems recognise patterns rather than treating every incident in isolation.

Children and young people should have opportunities to express what they are experiencing, what frightens them and what helps them feel safe.

Listening to children is important.

But listening should not become another burden.

A child should not be made responsible for deciding whether a family stays together, whether someone is prosecuted, where everyone lives or how adults resolve complex safety issues.

Their voice matters.

The responsibility for acting on what they tell us remains with adults.

Children affected by violence need more than instructions to be resilient.

They need safety, stability and adults they can trust.

A supportive adult may be a:

A reliable adult who listens, believes them, maintains appropriate boundaries and follows through can help a child understand that what they are experiencing is not their fault and that support exists.

Exposure to violence can have serious effects, but it does not determine a child's future.

Children and young people can recover, develop healthy relationships and regain a sense of safety.

Recovery may be supported by:

Healing does not require a child to forget what happened.

It means helping them live without violence continuing to define their world.

Teaching children about consent, boundaries and help-seeking matters.

But prevention cannot be placed on children alone.

Adults must also challenge abusive behaviour, recognise coercive control, create safer organisations, respond to disclosures, teach respectful relationships and hold people who use violence accountable.

Children have a role in learning about safety.

Adults have the responsibility for creating it.