Left: EULALEE THOMPSON Right: Dr. Maureen Samms-Vaughan, consultant paediatrician and child development specialist
OUR SOCIETY should be indebted to Dr. Maureen Samms-Vaughan, consultant paediatrician and child development specialist, for pulling together a brilliant treatise on Jamaica's children in her GraceKennedy Foundation Lecture 2006.
From legislation, to a compilation of newspaper reports, to various studies, to a historical overview, the report is a great piece of scholarship that couldn't come at a better time. Jamaica's children seem to be under more stress than ever - drugs, stabbings at schools, murders, spitting on teachers, teachers demonstrating, fights over cellphones, boyfriend broadcasting video of himself and his girlfriend in oral sex act, incest, and on and on. Wow! Where is the innocence of childhood? I can't recall being under so much stress as a child.
It's difficult to do justice to the paper in a brief article, but to zero in on some areas of interest such as 'the impact of poverty on children' and 'the impact of family life and family structure on children'.
POVERTY AND CHILDREN
On the question of poverty and children, Dr. Samms-Vaughan noted that the ones likely to involve themselves in antisocial acts are unemployed and uneducated youth, and that poor children are entrapped in a cycle of poverty.
"Children are indeed poor because the adults with whom they live are poor, but the story continues. Poor children are likely to become poor youth and poor adults who have homes with poor children. Children may, therefore, not only be caught in the crossfire of poverty, but may also be caught in the cycle of poverty," she said.
From her own studies, Dr. Samms-Vaughan points to the long arms of poverty impacting all aspects of development in the lives of six-year-old Jamaican children. It affects their growth (low height for age), cognitive function and educational attainment (poor children have lower scores on cognitive function and academic tests than rich children) and behavioural outcomes (more problem behaviours such as withdrawal, anxiety, depression, attention problems, delinquency, aggression, stealing, truancy).
From her own local studies again, Dr. Samms-Vaughan indicated that the direct pressure of poverty on children through a lack of basic goods and services, less available food, more hunger, malnutrition, poor sanitation and housing, fewer toys and less frequent school attendance than their peers.
FAMILY STRUCTURE
The parent relationships and parent-child interactions are also affected by poverty, which brings us to Dr. Samms-Vaughan's review of the impact of family structure and parenting on children. Studies from Western societies, she indicated, have found that children from father-absent homes exhibit more problem behaviours (sadness, depression, delinquency, aggression, sex role difficulties, early initiation of sexual activity, teen pregnancy, poor social and adaptive functioning and low self-esteem). Dr. Samms-Vaughan's studies on impact of local family structure on children produce very similar results.
"The absence of the typical Western family and social structure and its replacement by the mix of nuclear, patrifocal and matrifocal, and quasi-matrifocal family suggested to some that Jamaican children may not manifest similar behaviours. However, Jamaican children who live in less stable common-law and visiting unions, and those in single-parent homes or homes with a biological and surrogate parent are more withdrawn in their interactions with others, have more delinquent behaviours and are more aggressive to others," she said.
Child shifting (moving children from home to home) is also stressful on children physically (they must adjust to their new environment) and even more so, emotionally.
So, the research is there (and has always been there) but who will take responsibility for implementation of findings.
Please send your comments to eulalee.thompson@gleanerjm.com.
