Listening to Children: how we researched the Child First framework

samuelcraigie
Aug 20
5 min read

Consulting perspectives

Jess Hull, Senior Strategy & Insight Manager

Wednesday 20 August 2025

To mark the YJB’s Child First Day (20th August), we’re sharing some key insights from Crest’s recent research publication on how the Child First framework is applied in youth justice services. As part of our YJB commissioned research, we engaged children directly via a national survey to understand their experiences at their youth justice service, and to build evidence on how the tenets of the Child First framework translate into practice. Putting children’s experience central in research about the systems and structures that affect them is essential to ensure that solutions are collaborative and recognise the realities of children’s lives. Crest are experts at this, with years of collective experience listening to and collaborating with children in research. You can find other examples of our work with children and young people on our website.

Child First: the guiding principle for youth justice

Child First is the guiding principle of the youth justice system in England and Wales. It means seeing children as children, focusing on their rights, needs and potential and diverting them from the justice system. The Child First framework (YJB, 2022) is a tool created to help professionals make good decisions using the evidence on what works best for children in the justice system to improve outcomes, prevent offending and achieve safer communities with fewer victims. The Child First framework has four tenets:

Taking a trauma-informed approach to engaging children

To understand children’s experiences of receiving support from youth justice services, and to understand the extent to which this aligned with the tenets of the Child First framework, we conducted a national survey of children in youth justice services across England and Wales. The survey was designed to be accessible in both language and content, and was tested with youth engagement experts at the YJB. The questions in this survey did not explicitly use language aligned to the Child First tenets, but aimed to capture children’s broader experiences and feelings within the youth justice system (see figure 1). Our descriptive analysis then mapped these findings to the different Child First tenets, allowing us to better understand how children’s experiences align with the Child First framework and its tenets.

Figure 1. (excerpt of statements from children’s survey)

Think about your experience at your Youth Justice Service. How much do you agree or disagree with the following statements?

[1] I feel safe at the Youth Justice Service

[2] I like and trust my caseworkers

[3] I feel judged by adults in my Youth Justice Service

[4] I feel like a part of my community

[5] I feel positive about my future

[6] I understand the decisions that have been made about me

The survey was distributed to all youth justice services in England and Wales, available in paper or electronic format in both English and Welsh. In line with our ethical approach to engagement, we produced guidance and an information session to support youth justice practitioners to tell children about the survey, and support them to engage with the research.

Key elements of our ethical approach included:

Trauma-informed approach to survey design and content, including avoiding sensitive topics such as offence history, family or domestic situations, and a visible ‘quick exit’ button.
Clear and accessible information sheets for children to ensure informed consent
QR codes to enable children to access and complete the survey on a familiar device (such as a phone or tablet)
Guidance for practitioners on assessing Gillick competence to determine if a child between 13 and 15 years old can give informed consent to participate in the survey
Suggestions for practitioners on how to hold a group session to discuss the survey and research with children, and support them by answering questions.
Clear guidance for practitioners on how to avoid bias and ensure valid results, including emphasising the anonymity of the survey, and making sure children understand the survey is voluntary and they can skip questions or end the survey at any time.

In conducting this research with children, we built on our experience - including co-design and ethical approaches - across previous engagement with children and young people. See our blog ‘Trauma-informed Practice in Research’.

What did children tell us?

Insight from our survey shows that a majority of children feel supported, understood and listened to by adults at the youth justice service, with opportunities to be involved in planning and kept informed of decisions that affect them.

Children felt their experiences and capabilities were recognised, suggesting that practitioners made active efforts to understand and consider their individual circumstances (see Figure 2).

Figure 2: Proportion of children who answered ‘strongly’ and ‘slightly’ agreed in the Question: Based on your time at the youth justice service, how much do you agree or disagree with the following statement? (n=53)

Most children (95%) said they felt supported by adults in their youth justice service and 79% agreed their caseworker has helped them solve problems in their life. However, fewer children (60%) reported that they felt part of their community (see Figure 3).

Figure 3: Proportion of children who answered ‘strongly’ and ‘slightly’ agreed in the Question: Based on your time at the youth justice service,how much do you agree or disagree with the following statement? (n=53)

Children felt involved in planning their time at the youth justice service and included in decisions about them, however, there is a potential gap between children being involved in planning and actually having the opportunity to explore their interests (see Figure 4).

Figure 4: Proportion of children who answered ‘strongly’ and ‘slightly’ agreed in the Question: Based on your time at the youth justice service,how much do you agree or disagree with the following statement? (n=53)

Children (74%) did not feel judged by adults in the youth justice services and felt positive about their future. A smaller proportion (70%) agreed they had planned what they would like to do in the future. This suggests that caseworkers are playing an important role in fostering a future-oriented mindset.

Child-friendly research outputs

It is important that children are able to access and engage with research which involves and affects them. To enable this, we created child-friendly summaries of our research to share our findings in an accessible and engaging way with children, families and practitioners so that they can engage with the findings. Using shapes and guided questions, these summary reports lead children through the content in a way that follows a natural thought process. We hope these summary reports will encourage reflection and discussion. These accessible reports also help to show the children who contributed to the research how their insight has made a difference.

Please use the arrows below to view the four child-friendly summary reports. They are also available to download here.