Understanding Adultification and Why it’s Important
So many things in our work with children can get in the way of us seeing their vulnerability. One of these is a concept called ‘Adultification’ which in general terms means we can end up thinking about and responding to children as if they are adults. The following content explores the concept further and suggests a range of resources and learning materials to support your work with children and families.
Definition
The concept of adultification is where notions of innocence and vulnerability are not afforded to certain children. This is determined by people and institutions who hold power over children and young people. When adultification occurs outside of the home it is always founded within discrimination and bias.
There are various definitions of adultification, all relate to a child’s personal characteristics, socio-economic influences and lived experiences. Regardless of the context in which adultification takes place, the impact results in children’s rights being either diminished or overlooked.
(Listen Up, 2020)
The Adultification of Black Children
Adultification can affect any child but research shows that adultification explicitly and disproportionatley impacts black children.
ListenUp is a leading UK organisation that specialises in this area of work. They highlight the importance of considering ‘intersectionality‘ which is a way of understanding how a group’s or individual’s identity is made up of a unique combination of factors e.g. gender, race, age, sexuality, religion etc. All of these factors ‘intersect’ or overlap to create experiences of privelege or discrimation.
For example black girls can be perceived as hypersexual and therefore not identified as victims of child sexual abuse. Black boys are more likely to be viewed overall as aggresive and angry and therefore more likely to be treated as adults and subsequently more likely to receive a criminal justice response rather than a welfare/safeguarding one.
Further Resources
Youth Justice Board Film : Click HERE to watch the Youth Justice Board’s film on adultifcation. It explores the power of language when describing children and how this can contribute to their vulnerability and needs not being seen or responded to appropriately. For example being described as a perpertrator, gang member, repeat offender or drug user as opposed to child, being exploited or fearful of getting hurt.
Child Safeguarding Practice Reviews (CSPRs) : The links below will take you to the CSPRs completed where adultification was a feature.
Lewisham CSPR 2023 : Lilo
Birminghan CSPR : 2023 Adult A – Includes a webinar of the learning with specialist adultification and intersectionality input from Jahine Davis, CEO, ListenUp
Hackney CSPR 2022: Child Q – When this review was published we did our own Learning on a Page on the report which you can find HERE.
Waltham Forest CSPR 2020 : Child C
Newnham CSPR 2018 : Chris
Care Knowledge: Care Knowledge hosted a webinar in April 2026 called Adultification Bias: What Is It, What Harm Does It Do, And How Do We Guard Against It? Guest speakers included Sosa Henkoma, Sussana Clapcott and Dr Nicholas Marsh. You will need an individual or agency subscription to Care Knowledge to be able to watch a replay of the webinar. If you have a subscription then please access the replay HERE.
Care Knowledge provides a range of free to attend webinars. If you book a space and attend one of their free events you don’t need to have a paid subscription and you will be sent a link to the webinar you attended so you can watch the replay. The link is specific to you and you won’t be able to forward it to others so they can also watch it, the link won’t work for them. Replays of their free webinars are only available to those who attended and paid subscribers.
We suggest taking a look at their website regularly to see what events/webinars are taking place. You can find their events HERE.