Reasons For Child Abandonment

Legal definitions for what constitutes child abandonment vary by state, but in general, child abandonment is the practice of leaving a child either alone or with another individual without intending to retrieve the child again in the future. Child abandonment is a form of neglect and is punishable by law unless the parent takes advantage of the safe-haven laws present in all 50 states allowing a parent to abandon an infant as long as the child is relinquished according to state-specific guidelines.

Poverty

Parents who are unable to provide adequate care for their children may abandon them with the belief that the child will receive better care elsewhere or with the intention of preserving the family's current level of financial stability. A University of Chicago report on child abuse details that child abandonment around the world and throughout history has often been a consequence of extreme poverty.

Mental Illness

A mentally ill parent may not understand the risks a child suffers both physically and emotionally as the result of abandonment and walk away from her parenting responsibilities as a result. Depending on the form of mental illness, the parent may lack the ability to feel empathy for the child and view abandonment as a way to avoid the stresses of parenting. According to "Time" magazine, a child's mental illness can also lead to abandonment. A Nebraska safe-haven law allowing parents to abandon children of any age, rather than just infants, led to the abandonment of 34 school-age children and adolescents between September 2007 and November 2008. Of those children, 90 percent suffered from a form of mental illness.

Substance Abuse

The correlation between substance abuse and various forms of child neglect--including abandonment--is a strong one. A January 2010 guide by Virginia Commonwealth University notes that the behavior of parents who abuse drugs and alcohol is often erratic. Combined with the impaired judgment caused by substance abuse, erratic behavior may result in a parent neglecting or abandoning his child.

Fear

Unplanned pregnancy can elicit strong feelings of fear in a woman--especially if the mother-to-be is a teenager. According to the National Crime Prevention Council, abandoning an infant is one way that some mothers avoid the stigma associated with their unplanned pregnancies by hiding the fact that the pregnancy ever occurred. For some mothers, abandoning the child may be preferable to disclosing the truth to their friends and family. Abandoning a newborn carries a higher risk than abandoning an older child, since a newborn is unable to perform even the simplest activities for himself. A 1998 report by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Resources disclosed that out of 105 newborns abandoned in public places in 1998, 33 did not survive.