Table 2:
Prevalence of child abuse and career-related trauma by public safety personnel category
| Type of abuse/trauma | Category; no. (%) of respondents* | Significant differences† | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total n = 4073 |
Municipal/provincial police (a) n = 1091 |
Royal Canadian Mounted Police (b) n = 1027 |
Correctional workers (c) n = 577 |
Firefighters (d) n = 619 |
Paramedics (e) n = 550 |
Call center operators/dispatchers (f) n = 209 |
||
| Slapped on face, head or ears, or hit or spanked with something hard | 1880 (46.0) | 482 (44.2) | 440 (42.6) | 280 (48.5) | 305 (48.9) | 278 (50.0) | 95 (45.5) | a < e b < c, d, e |
| Pushed, grabbed or shoved, or something thrown at him/her | 831 (20.4) | 205 (18.9) | 198 (19.3) | 144 (25.0) | 121 (19.4) | 104 (18.7) | 59 (28.8) | a < c, f b < c, f d < c, f e < c, f |
| Kicked, bit, punched, choked, burned or attacked | 546 (13.2) | 127 (11.5) | 124 (11.8) | 91 (15.7) | 85 (13.3) | 86 (15.2) | 33 (15.4) | a < c, e b < c |
| Any physical abuse | 2018 (49.4) | 523 (47.9) | 477 (46.3) | 296 (51.2) | 326 (52.4) | 295 (53.2) | 101 (48.6) | a < e b < d, e |
| Sexual abuse | 583 (14.1) | 139 (12.7) | 129 (12.3) | 132 (22.8) | 47 (7.4) | 86 (15.2) | 50 (23.8) | a < c, f b < c, f d < a, b, c, e, f e < f, c |
| Exposure to intimate partner violence | 368 (8.9) | 94 (8.5) | 94 (9.0) | 62 (10.6) | 45 (7.0) | 48 (8.5) | 25 (11.7) | d < c, f |
| Any child abuse | 2275 (55.9) | 594 (54.4) | 547 (53.3) | 343 (59.4) | 340 (54.9) | 332 (60.4) | 119 (56.9) | a < c, e b < c, e |
| No. of types of child abuse | ||||||||
| 0 | 1798 (44.7) | 497 (46.4) | 480 (47.1) | 234 (41.3) | 279 (45.7) | 218 (40.1) | 90 (43.9) | c < a, b e < a, b |
| 1 | 1622 (40.4) | 436 (40.7) | 408 (40.0) | 209 (36.9) | 261 (42.8) | 236 (43.4) | 72 (35.1) | c < d, e f < e |
| ≥ 2 | 598 (14.9) | 139 (13.0) | 132 (12.9) | 124 (21.9) | 70 (11.5) | 90 (16.5) | 43 (21.0) | a < c, f b < c, f d < c, e, f e < c |
| Any career-related trauma | 3947 (94.0) | 95.2 (1061) | 1016 (95.9) | 502 (84.9) | 614 (94.8) | 557 (97.2) | 197 (92.1) | c < a, b, d, e, f d < e f < b, e |
*
Denominators vary as not all respondents answered all questions.
†
Significant differences at p < 0.05 in the prevalence of a history of child abuse and any career-related trauma between different public safety personnel categories based on logistic regression analyses.