Emily Putnam-Hornstein

Rather than focusing on sample groups or trying to track down study participants for her research on child maltreatment, Dr. Emily Putnam-Hornstein prefers to take a wide-angle view. As a research associate with the Center for Social Services Research at the University of California, Berkeley, she helped collect and analyze data on every report taken by child protective services in California. Available to the public online, the collection of information provides a customizable and expansive window into the state’s child welfare system. But Putnam-Hornstein envisions an even wider reach, and has big plans to expand the dataset.

The daughter of a law guardian and a kindergarten teacher, Putnam-Hornstein felt a natural draw to work with vulnerable populations. While pursuing a bachelor’s degree in psychology at Yale University, her work with the Bush Center for Child Development and Social Policy opened her eyes to the world of research. After spending time as a case worker for teens in foster care, Putnam-Hornstein realized she enjoyed the applied nature of research and earned a master’s degree in social work at Columbia University.

As she considered doctoral programs, UC Berkeley stood out due to its long-standing agreement that gave it access to a wealth of data on child protective services in California. Putnam-Hornstein found herself drawn to the vast collection of information; instead of sample data, the university had access to details about every instance of child maltreatment statewide. “These are the actual children and families that are being affected,” she says.

While impressed by the data set, Putnam-Hornstein quickly realized that it only afforded researchers a view of maltreatment at the moment child welfare officials became involved, not what came before or what follows. She successfully secured access to 4.3 million confidential birth records from 1999 to 2006, as well as 25,000 death records, and set about linking them to child protective services data, placing those children involved in the child welfare system in a larger context. Her next step is to convince state officials to provide emergency room and hospital records, giving investigators an even wider view of the trajectory of maltreatment and providing insight into where resources should be targeted. “The data are just sitting there, waiting to be linked,” Putnam-Hornstein says.

Although she acknowledges that privacy protections and data sharing can be tricky at times, she is confident that state officials will become more comfortable with the process once they see the possibilities of her research. Her long-term goal is to develop a greater understanding of the context surrounding child maltreatment to provide assistance to at-risk families before maltreatment occurs. She also envisions developing a summer training institute at USC to provide guidance to researchers and students interested in working with the UC Berkeley data.