Child abuse is the intentional, unexplainable
infliction of physical, moral, and sexual pain and
suffering on a child. It is caused mainly by parents
who were maltreated as children themselves. Causes
also include stress, poverty, and/or unemployment.
There are many cases of abuse, but those such as Elisa
Izquierdo's stand out. Child abuse consists of
various different causes, types, and cases.
There are many causes for child abuse, but some
project over the rest.
In some cases children are
mistreated when parents or caretakers have maladaptive
responses to stressful situations or feel powerless.
Searching for relief, they may hit someone with even
less power than them, and these are often children.
Other times it is the result of family problems over
which the abuser has no control. Alcohol was said to
be involved in fourteen percent of the cases of abuse
and in eighteen and a half percent of the cases of
neglect. "Religion, residence in the city or country,
region of the country, and race are all related to
violence in a home." Approximately eighty percent of
the child-abusers were themselves abused as children.
A high percentage of abusing parents feel that they
are legitimately exercising their parental right. The
parents injure their offspring hoping that the child
will change a manner or learn a lesson. They take the
idea of discipline to a brutal degree. In some cases
the parents are simply too young and/or immature to
take good care of their children. There is a higher
percentage rate of mistreatment in families with mixed
religion marriages. Very often it is a recollection
of small pressures that finally make a parent explode.
It is most likely that the abuser is employed only
part-time or is jobless. Retired men and women are
the least likely to harm a child.