“Child Abuse and Neglect” seminar which was organized by the Department of Psychology, Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Istinye University and moderated by Head of Department of Psychology Prof. Dr. M. Rita KRESPİ with the participation of Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ceren ACARTÜRK, Prof. Dr. Figen ŞAHİN DAĞLI and Prof. Dr. Tolga DAĞLI; was hold at the Topkapi Campus of Istinye University.
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ceren ACARTÜRK started her speech with indicating types of abuse and she told “The traumas that start with neglect in early ages are very important. In the researches, it was determined that the abuse in childhood was related to later physical problems such as diabetes and heart disease in adulthood.” With her statement, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ceren ACARTÜRK pointed out that negativities in childhood may lead to bigger problems in the future and she said child abuse is a problem in dealing with stress in the long term.
Prof. Dr. Figen ŞAHİN DAĞLI who said that the fight against child abuse are required to be determined and conscious, emphasized the importance of solution focused fight against child abuse with her statement of “We need to understand this very well, and instead of lamenting, we have to figure out how to avoid it. For example, headlines thrown in newspapers like 1 out of every 3 children are abused, creates a problematic perspective because even only one child is exposed to abuse, it is a big problem.”. Prof. Dr. Figen ŞAHİN DAĞLI who mentioned about the types of child abuse, made a comparison between the concepts of abuse and neglect by her statement of “We must meet the needs of the child, but we must also teach him/her to fulfill his/her responsibilities. For example, doing children’s homework for them may be considered as a kind of neglect.”. Saying that beating the child which is observed in our society is considered as an abuse, Dr. Figen ŞAHİN DAĞLI emphasized that violence can never be a solution in establishing the sense of responsibility of the child.
Saying that violence against children is a social problem, Prof. Dr. Tolga DAĞLI stated that child abuse should be perceived as a social and cultural situation. He indicated that violence against children issue should be handled from a broad perspective with his statements of “Violence against children is not just the problem of a family but is the problem of the whole society. We have learned that we have to approach this problem at the cultural, social and macro level”. Emphasizing the importance of sectors and associations working together on child abuse, Prof. Dr. Tolga DAĞLI mentioned about the details of the responsibilities on the universities’ part at this stage.
