Understanding the effects of child abuse.

Child abuse is one of the difficult social phenomena with which the technologist directly deals as a part of his professional responsibilities. To be able to respond to all of the child's needs, radiologic technologists need to understand not only the physical effects, but also the psychological effects of the child. Understanding also helps the technologist deal with his own feelings when interacting with either the abused child or the child's parents. The Draw-A-Person test (DAP) was utilized in this study to illustrate visually the effect of abuse on the child's self-image. The subsequent personality characteristics of these children include low self-esteem, withdrawal, extreme forms of impulse control, and self-destructive behavior. Using the DAP, the abused child's self-portrait frequently showed body distortion, lack of detailing and poor sexual identification. In addition, the personality pattern of abusing parents was found to have many of the same characteristics as the personalities of abused children, because many times abusing parents were themselves abused as children.