Table 2.

Summary of Social Media and Internet-based Approaches for Child Maltreatment Surveillance or Epidemiological Research.

Author	Year	Population	Research Purpose	Recruitment Method/Study Design
Online recruitment
Balsam, Lehavot, Beadnell, Circo	2010	LGB Adults	Examine relationships between child abuse and adult mental health	•Online questionnaire •Invitations sent to LGB listservs, websites, groups, organizations, and clubs in all states, specifically targeted LGB people of color •Participants asked to forward to other eligible individuals/groups
Parkinson, Bromfield	2013	Young Adults	Determine if Facebook is viable for recruiting for studies on child maltreatment	•Online questionnaire •Invitation via Facebook
Schaefer, Mundt, Ahlers, Bahls	2012	Not restricted	Examine psychosocial impairment associated with sexual abuse	•Online questionnaire •Invitation on initiators’ website, Twitter, references from political activists, contact through victim support groups
Brian, Schier, Schulz, Dragan, Hardt	2012	Not restricted	Estimate the prevalence of childhood abuse and neglect in Germany and Poland	•Online questionnaire •Recruited through an online market research firm
Caldas, Bensy	2014	Child with disability or caregiver of child with disability	Determine risk factors and consequences of sexual maltreatment of children with disabilities	•Online questionnaire •Invitations sent via weekly email for nine months to groups or individuals who had “publicized interest” in child sexual maltreatment or children with disabilities •Initial contacts asked to forward to other groups/individuals
Maier, Mohler-Kuo, Landholt, Schnyder, Jud	2013	Child sexual abuse agencies in Switzerland	Estimate the prevalence of child sexual abuse reported to agencies	•Ongoing reports of child sexual abuse for six months •Online access to secure server for reporting number of cases •Based on publicly available data, agencies related to child sexual abuse were identified and selected using a stratified random sample framework
Nwadiuko, Isbell, Zolotor, Hussey, Kotch	2010	Existing cohort study participants	Evaluate Facebook and Myspace as supplementary methods of subject follow-up	•Follow-up to existing cohort study •Facebook and Myspace search for participants by name and location; profile created with study or PI name; message sent to subject asking for verification
Electronic News Media
Lonne, Gillespie	2014	Media reports of child abuse	Compare media reports of child maltreatment to official reports	•Analysis of content of media reports •Electronic search of 10 newspapers with the largest readership in Australia using search terms: child*, AND abuse*, neglect, protection, safety, OR pedophile* OR aedophil* OR parent neglect, OR harm, OR maltreatment
Walklate, Petrie	2013	Media reports of filicide-suicide	Explore the nature of reporting on filicide-suicide in Britain and Ireland	•Analysis of online newspaper reports •Lexis Nexis search using search terms: murder-suicide, family tragedy, or family death
Nambu, Nasu, Nishimura, Nishimura, Fujiwara	2011	Media reports of fatal child abuse cases	Determine if fatal child abuse perpetrators are more harshly punished than other homicide perpetrators	•Analysis of reports from three major newspaper articles •Search of newspaper databases using search terms: abuse, fatal, prosecutor-suggested sentences, court sentence
Caregiver Blogs
Brown, Gonzalez, Wiester, Kelley, Feldman	2014	Perpetrators of medical abuse	Evaluate caregiver blogs as a source of information about caregiver-fabricated illness	•Case study comparison of information presented on caregiver blog about illness to information provided by medical providers •Interest search for blogs of potential cases of caregiver-fabricated illness
Social Networks
Noll, Shenk, Barnes, Haralson	2013	Adolescent females	Determine differences in online sexual behaviors between adolescent females with and without maltreatment	•Maltreatment youth recruited through child protective services, control youth recruited through flyers at local hospital •Online questionnaires and review of social network profiles •Content coding of publicly available profile pages