Children and Families

A growing body of psychological research has examined the effects of armed
and political conflict on children, including, for example, work in Lebanon
(Macksoud, et al.,1996), Palestine (Baker, 1990, 1993; Elbedour et al., 1997; El
Sarraj and Qouta, 2005; Punamaki et al., 2001), South Africa (Dawes, 1990),
Mozambique (Cliff and Noormahomed, 1993), Iraq (Dyregrov, 1993), Cambodia
(Garbarino, 1993), Bosnia (Weine et al., 1995), Angola (McIntyre and Ventura,
1995), Guatemala (Miller, 1996), and Latin America (Allodi, 1989). This article
explores children’s experiences of war within a global political economy of
silence. The goal of this work is to capture children’s complex understandings of,
and responses to, the trauma of ongoing militarization and political occupation as
reflected in their perceptions of the loss of their homes.
By utilizing the voices of children facing attacks against their home/safe space,
this article argues that understanding trauma in conflict zones requires looking
closely at children’s descriptions of their ever-shifting relationships to different
spaces as sites of trauma, resilience and agency. Further, listening to how children
reconstruct their individual and collective histories opens up possibilities
for theorizing social trauma through a feminist and liberationist framework. By
using contextually aware critical theories of feminist and liberation psychology
we draw attention to the intimate connections between history, economic activities,
globalization and globalized social relations (see Burman, 1998; Tickner,
1991; Wilkinson, 1997)

Jonathan Woocher’s 2012 essay, “Reinventing Jewish Education for the 21st Century,” o ered
a distillation of concepts and prescriptions he
had been incubating for the better part of a decade (Woocher, 2012a). At its core was a
vision of a learner-centered educational system where Jewish wisdom (i.e., Torah) becomes a resource for personal meaning-making. Those familiar with the trajectory of Woocher’s thinking were surely not surprised by his enthusiasm for prosumerism or his relative sanguinity about
the decline of legacy institutions. But they might have been caught o  guard by the virtual absence of any reference to a role for community and Jewish peoplehood in his proposed educational paradigm. For Woocher, Jewish community had been an animating concern that presaged his interest in communal dynamics, guided his work as the longtime executive director of the Jewish Education Service of North America ( JESNA), and grounded his e orts on behalf of Jewish continuity and renaissance. Was Woocher’s silence on community in “Reinventing Jewish Education” indicative of a radical rethinking of the bases of Jewish life?

В книге представлены учебные и методические материалы по семейной финансовой медиации, используемые в Carolina Dispute Settlement Services (г. Роли, Северная Каролина, США). Описаны наиболее распространенные подходы к организации и ведению процесса семейной медиации в практике США. Освоение предложенных приемов модерации коммуникации между сторонами сделает процесс медиации семейных конфликтов более глубоким и эффективным. В книгу включены некоторые нормативные и правовые документы штата Северная Каролина, регулирующие подготовку медиаторов, их профессиональную деятельность и ответственность.
Материалы мануала могут быть полезны медиаторам, педагогам, психологам, социальным работникам, конфликтологам, юристам, студентам, обучающимся по соответствующим специальностям, и всем, кто заинтересован в конструктивном разрешении семейных и других видов конфликтов.

Le présent article vise à appréhender la gestation pour autrui (GPA) sous l’angle de l’accès aux origines et à mettre en exergue les difficultés et les questions susceptibles de se poser lors de la recherche de ses origines par un enfant/adulte né par le
biais de cette méthode particulière.

The termination of parental rights of parents with mental disabilities is a growing and crucial issue.  In 2010, an estimated 45.9 million adults in the U.S. had experienced a mental illness in the past year. This represents 20% of the adult population.  More than five million children in the U.S. have a parent with a serious mental illness such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, or major depression.  Courts and child welfare systems too often assume that a parent is not amenable to treatment and is a danger to his or her child when strong symptoms of mental turmoil surface.  Some studies report that as many as 70 to 80% of mentally ill parents have lost custody.  Public systems are overwhelmed by this matter in an era of shrinking resources for such systems.  However, often parents with mental health needs are willing to accept treatment, are able to participate in programming, and are worthy of regaining custody. 
• There are gaps in federal and state law on this issue.  The federal Adoption and Safe Families Act (ASFA) requires that state child welfare agencies and courts make “reasonable efforts” towards family reunification before the termination of parental rights (TPR) can take place.  However, federal statutes and case law provide little guidance to states about what “reasonable efforts” means, and states have been left to interpret that concept individually.  Many state statutes even enable a “bypass” of the “reasonable efforts” standard when “clear and convincing” evidence allegedly shows that a parent's mental condition cannot be changed.  Many states likewise place unjust, statutory and common law time limits on family reunification efforts in TPR cases. 
• Gaps in legal scholarship are also evident here.  Legal scholars have begun to discuss the inadequacy of reunification services for mentally challenged parents, the tenuous link between mental health services and child welfare agency action, the need for enhanced attorney and child welfare worker preparation in this arena, and a need for cultural competence in reunification services.  Others have even suggested that there be a rebuttable presumption in favor of family reunification.  However, those discussions lack a sound theoretical basis and a practical application of solutions. 
• As is featured in previous work of this author, a new theoretical framework of Family Systems Theory-- which is utilized in clinical behavioral health and human rights arenas-- must first be applied.  Under this theoretical framework, the vague and outdated “best interests of the child” standard, which is a legal standard used exclusively in family law cases, must be replaced with a more sound standard of “holistic family wellbeing.”  Vulnerability Theory can add credence to this theoretical framework.
• The discussion of reunification services for families featuring parents with mental disabilities should then be conducted utilizing Family Systems Theory and a legal standard of “holistic family wellbeing.”  Under these circumstances, the “family integrity” defended by our highest courts through the “reasonable efforts” provision should be upheld through the delivery of highly effective family reunification services.  The application of Family Systems Theory ultimately requires reform in the law, service delivery, and professional practice.  State and federal legislators must revisit the “reasonable efforts” standard, to include specific statutory language about the types of reunification services required and the need for flexible timelines.  Courts, child welfare agencies, and service providers need to deliver proven reunification services and coordinated mental health treatment.  In specific court cases, attorneys for the parent(s), the child(ren), and the state should focus on “holistic family wellbeing” utilizing collaborative family law and alternative dispute resolution, while advancing the agency of their clients.  Child welfare workers and practitioners likewise require training in advanced methods of conflict resolution and clinical practice.  These recommendations can ensure more effective family law practice and more successful family - serving systems.

This chapter argues that there is a collective responsibility to have enough children in order to ensure that people will not, in the future, suffer great harm due to depopulation. Moreover, if people stopped having children voluntarily, it could be legitimate for states to incentivize and maybe even coerce individuals to bear and rear children. Various arguments against the enforceability of an individual duty to bear and rear children are examined. Coercing people to have children would come at significant moral cost; however, none of the arguments against enforceability seem decisive. The existence of a collective responsibility to have children bears on the question of whether parents and non-parents ought to shoulder the costs of childbearing and child rearing together.

Disorganized/Disoriented (D) attachment has seen widespread interest from policy makers, practitioners, and clinicians in recent years. However, some of this interest seems to have been based on some false assumptions that (1) attachment measures can be used as definitive assessments of the individual in forensic/child protection settings and that disorganized attachment (2) reliably indicates child maltreatment, (3) is a strong predictor of pathology, and (4) represents a fixed or static “trait” of the child, impervious to development or help. This paper summarizes the evidence showing that these four assumptions are false and misleading. The paper reviews what is known about disorganized infant attachment and clarifies the implications of the classification for clinical and welfare practice with children. In particular, the difference between disorganized attachment and attachment disorder is examined, and a strong case is made for the value of attachment theory for supportive work with families and for the development and evaluation of evidence-based caregiving interventions.

"Guavas for Dummies, American Jíbaras, & Postnational Autonomy: When I Was Puerto Rican in the Hemispheric Turn" (2019) re-engages this text after I taught it in Puerto Rico four years. In this 2009 essay, Santiago’s memoir is said to bridge U.S. and Caribbean lit. WIWPR begins with a remembered Puerto Rico, and ends in the author’s adulthood in the USA. Studying Santiago’s text within a trajectory of immigrant narratives familiarizes the text to readers who are often processing their own entries into the US / its cultural orbit. This essay examines Santiago’s representation of jibaros, a subculture whose place in in Puerto Rico parallels the conflicted relationship many Jamaicans have with Rastafarians. Also, the theme of “Translating and Resisting Imperialism” is developed through a close reading of the chapter “The American Invasion of MacÚn.” Santiago’s treatment of gender roles in her family is also explored.

Early Intervention has the potential to alter children's developmental trajectory significantly.  However, many EI services risk devaluing families' contribution to children's learning and development and children's varying strengths and competencies.  This research identified key characteristics of relationship-based EI services that place families at the centre of intervention.  The research is funded by a Winston Churchill Fellowship.

It is sometimes argued that the non-therapeutic, non-consensual alteration of children’s genitals should be discussed in two separate ethical discourses: one for girls (in which such alterations should be termed ‘female genital mutilation’ or FGM), and one for boys (in which such alterations should be termed ‘male circumcision’). In this article, I call into question the moral and empirical basis for such a distinction, and argue that all children—whether female, male, or intersex—should be free from having parts of their genitals removed unless there is a pressing medical indication.

A BIBLICAL ANALYSIS OF THE ROLES OF THE FAMILY AND THE CHURCH REGARDING FAITH IMPARTATION


Dr. Jeffrey A Klick
Trinity College of the Bible and Theological Seminary
Chair: Dr. Max O. Sturdivant, Jr.

Keywords: Family, Marriage, Parental Responsibility, Age-Segregated, Age-Integrated


    Studies show that multitudes of young people raised in Christian homes are fleeing the Evangelical Church in record numbers as they leave High School. In this research, the Scripture is examined in detail specifically searching for examples and commands concerning the role of parents, children, and the Church regarding the impartation of faith to the next generation.     
    An evaluation of the individual roles of each family member is made, and the impact of a godly marriage is also considered. In addition, a brief foray is made into the problems associated with the non-traditional homes that plagues our nation through the rampant rise of divorce and single family homes.
    The specific commands in Scripture directed towards each family member are considered, and it is discovered that there are virtually no direct commands given to the organized religious community regarding faith impartation into the next generation. The Biblical commands that exist typically address each person on how to fulfill their role as a parent, spouse or child, but little specific instruction is given as to the organized Church's responsibility.
    The conclusions of this research show that the Scripture is a family-centric Book that has a great deal to say to and about the family, but very little regarding the organized religious community's role in the faith transference process. There is room within the realm of preference and necessity for a variety of church models; however, there is little in the Scripture directly pertaining to their usage.
      While many church models are experiencing a huge exodus of young people rejecting their parent’s faith as they leave High School, one group in particular  stands in startling contrast regarding the ratio of faith adoption. Studies show up to 92% of home school children retaining their parents faith as they enter college and beyond. The family-integrated church model is primarily populated with home educated young people, so it is examined in some detail.
    The underlying philosophical differences are compared between the two models, primarily focusing on the role of the pastor and the parents. In the traditional age-segregated model, the pastor or staff is often the initiator of ministry and families are encouraged to join the pastor or staff in outreach or service. In the family-integrated model, the pastor encourages the parents to be the initiators of outreach and ministry, as each family is ready or able to serve.

Introduction: Indonesia is a country that has a cultural feature related to child care. Grandparents can act as a parent because of unexpected factors such as t h e parents dying, accidents, illness, t h e p a r e n t s b e i n g dependent on drugs, imprisonment, studying abroad or t h e parents still b e i n g adolescents. The aim of this research was to determine the difference between the stimulation and personal-social development of school-aged children taken care of by their grandparents and parents respectively. Method: The sample used consisted of 20 children taken care of by their grandparents and 30 children taken care of by their parents in one of the Elementary Schools in Surabaya. The independent variable was stimulation and the dependent variable was personal-social development. The data was collected using a questionnaires t h a t w a s analyzed using ChiSquare and Spearman rho's with significance α<0.05. Results: The results showed there to be a significant di...

Children’s television is an important and heavily researched subject area that has a long and outstanding tradition. However, while there are a lot of academic works on the content of children’s programming and the production aspect, the issue of children as a specific group of audience is addressed less frequently, and often in a very one-sided way of looking at the risks and benefits of children’s media practices.

This research is taking an audience approach to the study of children’s television, particularly focusing on children’s viewing practices and the use of multifunctional media devices in the home. The findings will come from a recent and original qualitative study of families, their everyday viewing practices and attitudes towards television and media technologies. The paper will argue that the study of children’s viewing habits have the potential to transform the way we think not only about children’s television, but also about television as a medium more generally, as there is evidence to suggest that family viewing practices are indeed undergoing a transformation. The paper will demonstrate that when it comes to children’s viewing, the discussion of television is no longer simply about the ‘telly’, but rather about ‘screens’, with children living in increasingly multimedia homes, using a variety of media devices for a variety of media practices that often compete, overlap and conflate. This paper aims to show that in the context of the home and children’s viewing, what we mean by television is changing, with the boundaries around the medium, its content and technology often blurring.

The World Health Organisation defines health promotion as “the processof enabling people to increase control over, and to improve, their health”. EIIP undertook activities aimed at raising awareness of psychosis and the help available. The Early Intervention in Psychosis's health promotion strategy reduced admission by 75% between 2009-2010. The service's caseload is 69% male and the reason for this seems to be explored further.

Female faculty underrepresentation in higher education is perpetuated by gender-based social and professional practices and roles. Existing research confirms gender disparities in faculty recruitment, retention, salary, tenure, and mentorship. This book explores how female, tenure-track faculty navigate the process of balancing their personal and professional lives.

Utilizing a qualitative phenomenological approach, the stories of nine female, full-time tenure-track and tenured faculty as well as four administrators employed in faculty diversity, development, and work-life are explored. With a blended application of poststructuralist feminism and work-family border theoretical framework, the book illustrates gender norms, roles, and boundaries as experienced and interpreted by female faculty navigating their work, family, and community spheres of influence. This book highlights the first known study to explore a “new Ivy” institution, and there are no other known studies that incorporate both the qualitative perspectives of female faculty as well as those of the faculty diversity and development administrators who oversee and develop the very programs and policies that support those faculty. A key chapter in the book, “Baby, It’s Cold Inside: Faculty Context & Campus Climate” offers unique insight into what female faculty, and those who love them, face on the path to tenure today.

Five thematic findings are overviewed and explored: faculty support comes in many forms; seeking clarity in job elements and teaching, research, service (TRS) ratios; coping strategies in the wake of an overloaded TRS ratio (“Quick meals, late nights, and what gym?”); family borders in the academy, and work-life-family fit: stability, not balance. This work aims to stimulate faculty gender norm consciousness and acknowledge and relay the unique challenges in faculty’s pursuit of work-life-family stability, career path navigation, and role negotiation. The author offers an insider’s glimpse of modern faculty and administrator lives for the benefit of tenure-track faculty, their departments, their families, and higher education institutions at large. This work aims to better inform university and departmental policy planning and enhance institutional understanding and subsequent support in and of the faculty experience, and thus the experiences of the increasingly diverse students whom educational institutions aim to serve.

.. Reproductive health is concerned with the people’s ability to have a satisfying and safe sex life ensuring their capability to reproduce with a liberty of making a decision that if, when and how often they have to do so. Objective: (1) To examine the females perceptions, attitude and practices about reproductive health services. (2) To determine the level of their empowerment to take decisions and make choices regarding their own reproductive health. (3) To determine the level of the quality, availability and accessibility of reproductive health services and to suggest some measures for policy makers to improve the reproductive health state of young mothers in district Faisalabad. Study Design: A sample of 600 young married females of age 15-32 years were selected through multistage sampling technique. Period: 2009. Setting Area: Rural and urban area of District Faisalabad. Material and Method: Uni-variate (frequency distribution and percentage) and Bi-variate analysis (Chi square and Gamma Statistics) was carried out. Results: Most (44.0%) of the respondents belonged to age category of 26-30 years; 35.5% were married up to 18 years; 39.3% had passed up to 5 years marriage duration; 71.8% had primary and above level of education. Majority (65.9%) had up to Rs.10,000 per month income, 49.2% possessed 6-10 family members, 73.5% beard at least 2 and above live children, 74.0 % perceived family planning good,79.7% had knowledge of FP and 26.0% practiced FPM (Family Planning Method). The most common FPMs were condom (33.3%) and tubectomy (21.8%) while 41.0% faced side effect because of FPM during their reproductive life. A huge majority (79.8%) of the respondents received ANC, 87.8% made regular visits for medical checkup and 48.8% got ANC from Pvt. Hospital during last pregnancy. Bi-variate analysis showed highly significant relation among age at marriage, awareness level, monthly income, education, number of pregnancies, number of children, number of visits to medical centre, availability of RH services, cultural hindrance and age of respondents vs. their reproductive health. Conclusions: Although most of the females were young & educated mothers with good reproductive health experience and perceived FM good but still lacking in practicing FMPs which indicates that we need to pay more attention towards female empowerment and decision making authority status at domestic level.

Although the title Alumbramiento references childbirth, children are conspicuously absent throughout the film: motherhood defines Maria, but not her children. In framing death by referencing the absence of children, the film also comments on the discontinuous nature of the post-Francoist Spanish family.

The present study investigated the association between the level of middle-age children's attachments to their parents and their family relationship. In addition, this study also examined whether the level of children's attachment to their parents varied by gender. The study design is quantitative acquiring relational patterns. In line with the purpose of this study, the sample group consisted of 208 students (103 girls, 105 boys) in fifth grade attending middle school in the district of Kartepe in İzmit province, Turkey. In this study, " Kerns' Security Scale (KSS) " and " The Family Relationships Scale for Children " were used for data collection. During the analysis of data collected, t-test and Pearson' correlation coefficient were used for unrelated measurements. The results of the study concluded that the association of the level of children's attachment to their parents was moderate and negative with discouraging family relationships and was moderate and positive with supportive family relationships.

The family and its important role in the development of the child is the inspiration for many types of research that have the intention to emphasize certain aspects of family life and the consequences of the family relations in the development of the children.The issue of this research is to find out if there is a connection between the conflict in the family, the divorce of the parents and self-concept in the children of early school age. The research is conducted on 30 children of single-parent families. The children of these single-parent families are children who have lived in families with conflicts and they have been direct or indirect participants in the conflict of the divorced parents.In the process of research, we applied projective techniques: Machover which consists of drawing a person’s figure, as well as a drawing a house and a tree-HTP (House-Tree-Person).The results are obtained through qualitative analysis and interpretation of each drawing particularly.During the i...

THE RIGHTS OF GRANPARENTS AND GRANDCHILDREN TO KEEP A DIRECT AND REGULAR RELATIOSHIP: ORIGINS AND CRITICISM LEVELLED AT ARTICLE 229-2 OF THE CHILEAN CODE AND ITS JUDICIAL ENFORCEMENT. A CASE ABOUT AN EXCESSIVE ENFORCEMENT OF THE BEST INTEREST OF THE CHILD PRINCIPLE

This research-based storybook for young children, contains research information in the back for parents, educators and family workers. The narrative follows the experiences of five-year-old Anthony who describes his struggles with waiting for his parent to come home from military deployment, his anger at his parent for being away for so long and the ways he stays in contact, despite the distance. The book was produced from research data and findings as part of a PhD study entitled 'Young children's experiences and understandings of parental deployment within an Australian Defence Force family' using the Mosaic approach and Narrative research methods. The research themes explored in the book include Emotional responses to deployment and post-deployment, tools and stories that assist children to understand the concepts of deployment and family communication. The eBook is an example of the way research data and findings can be made accessible to the general public to create impact. In this instance, the book is made available free of charge to parents, children, educators and family workers through a partnership with the Defence Community Organisation and the Department of Defence.

A free childhood Children should grow up in a free environment, where they are respected as individuals, and where they can pursue the activities, which they have a natural interest in. First of all because this is what makes children happy. And secondly, because this is one of the best ways to ensure that they grow up to become competent and responsible adults, who can take care of themselves, their fellow human beings and the rest of our old, blue planet.

Title: Where Is the Family in Global Mental Health?
Presenter:  Vincenzo Di Nicola, M.D., Ph.D.

Learning Objectives:
Audience participants will be able to:
(1) Articulate why a central role for families is needed for the effectiveness of clinical and research programs in Global Mental Health (GMH);
(2) Describe how health categories that focus solely on individuals can obscure awareness of relational, social, and cultural processes that contribute to health and illness.

Abstract:

From a family perspective, the Global Mental Health Movement appears as a regressive step to the usual Western health categories that focus on individuals as bearers of larger issues in the family, community, society and culture. These larger envelopes are addressed in the impersonal way of categories—e.g., child abuse, substance abuse, violence, and treatment gaps—rather than from the relational, social and cultural perspectives that define mental health and illness more fully, meaningfully, and realistically. These aspects of GMH may deepen the practitioners’ perception of public health and epidemiology and their international organizations as being removed from clinical concerns and from their meaningful relational contexts. Without such notions as attachment and belonging, ignoring the most significant of human relationships based on the family and community, GMH risks creating another disembodied field divorced from our lived experience as communal and relational beings.


References

Di Nicola, Vincenzo. A Stranger in the Family: Culture, Families, and Therapy. New York & London: W.W. Norton, 1997.

Di Nicola, Vincenzo. Letters to a Young Therapist: Relational Practices for the Coming Community. New York & Dresden: Atropos Press, 2011.

Di Nicola, Vincenzo. Family, psychosocial, and cultural determinants of health. In: Sorel, Eliot, ed., 21st Century Global Mental Health. Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Learning, 2012, pp. 119-150.


Bio Sketch

Vincenzo Di Nicola, MPhil, MD, PhD, is a Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist who uses family, social and cultural perspectives to investigate children and families in disadvantaged contexts, both at home and abroad. He works with migrant children and families and the impacts of trauma. Di Nicola is the author of “A Stranger in the Family: Culture, Families, and Therapy” (1997), “Letters to a Young Therapist” (2011), and a forthcoming selection of his writing, “On the Threshold: Children, Families, and Culture Change,” edited and introduced by Armando Favazza, MD, MPH. Di Nicola is Chair of the APA Global Mental Health Caucus and Full Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Montreal.

To (1) clarify the epidemiology of bad dreams in children and investigate risk and protective factors related to (2) the child's sleep, (3) parental sleep-enabling practices, and (4) the child's temperament. Longitudinal with 6 time points from 5 months to 6 years. Subjects' homes. Representative sample of 987 children in the Province of Quebec. None. Longitudinal logistic regression analysis models with primary endpoints of presence or absence of parent-rated bad dreams at 29 months, 41 months, 50 months, 5 years, and 6 years and predictor variables of demographic characteristics, parent ratings of child's sleep characteristics, parental sleep-enabling practices (e.g., cosleeping), and child's psychological characteristics at 5 and 17 months (anxiousness, temperament). Mothers' ratings indicated lower than expected prevalence of frequent bad dreams (1.3% to 3.9%). Demographic correlates of bad dreams were high family income, absence of siblings at 29 months,...

An emergent life insurance market in Swaziland is prompting some families to remake kinship as the entrustment of a generation of deceased relatives’ children. Coincident with high HIV/AIDS mortality and changing economic policies for the financial services sector, Swaziland saw an influx of foreign insurance companies in the early 2000s. Those companies offered incentives like burial coverage and cash stipends, and they compelled families’ legal adoption of children as orphans through the state, an ambiguous contrast to customary child entrustment and caregiving practices. I offer ethnographic insight on financialization in the global South and conceptualize insurance as a biopolitical, moralized “compassion technology,” which enveloped persons’ financial-legal obligations within humanitarian and global health discourses of social regeneration.

Racial discrimination is a chronic stressor in the lives of African Americans.  Chronic stress can lead to individual mental and physical health problems, which subsequently can have deleterious effects on family life.  The current study explored the effects of perceived discrimination on youth outcomes and examined the potential mediating role of maternal depression.  Using data from 189 African American mothers with children aged 7 to 14 years, maternal perceived discrimination accounted for variance in reported child externalizing behaviors over and beyond that attributable to other stressful life events and socio-demographic variables.  Also, maternal depressive symptoms mediated the effect of maternal perceived discrimination on child externalizing behaviors.  These results are consistent with the view that mothers’ experience of greater discrimination leads to higher maternal depression which, in turn, leads to greater externalizing behavior among their children. The findings support the need for further exploration of macrosystemic effects that can influence African American youth externalizing behaviors.  The results are discussed in terms of the need to include consideration of discrimination in preventive interventions aimed at increasing support systems available to African American mothers.

This PhD thesis explored the experiences of children whose parent had cancer and their information needs and behaviour to cope with the challenges they faced as dependent children and care-givers. The aim of the thesis was to understand children’s information experience including their perception of cancer and information culture; information needs, information seeking behaviour, barriers and enablers.

The research used a six-stage process. This study was informed by an extensive literature review and discussions with cancer specialists, psychologists and researchers from United Kingdom, United States, Australia and Malaysia. This study used a three-cycle, eight-step process of Participative Action Research (PAR) with data on the experiences of ten Malay families; ten breast cancer patients and 22 dependent children.

Three instruments were developed for this thesis. First was the Inquiry to Participate Form (InqFE-v.04 and InqFBM-v.02), an instrument to help in selecting potential participants who had dependent children and were willing to participate. The second instrument was a set of three questions that were opened-ended and formed a line of inquiry to obtain children’s cancer experience and information needs. Drawing as a communication and narrative tool was used to encourage children’s responses. The third instrument was a 15-question questionnaire (CQ1) to understand children’s experience and preference in obtaining information. All instruments were translated into Bahasa Malaysia for use in Malaysia.

A total of 205 respondents were collected from the selection process from activities held at the National Cancer Society Malaysia. A total of 30 families volunteered to participate, however, only ten families could commit to the study.

It was found that cancer affected parenting abilities and the challenging experiences identified that a lack of culturally relevant information and the shift in caregiving responsibilities to dependent children necessitated a more assessable, supportive and sensitive information system.

It was also found that children’s understanding of cancer was influenced by their experiences and observations, many of which resulted in misconceptions about cancer, its causes, treatment and preventative measures. It seemed that children participant’s reaction to a health situation triggered their information behaviour. Children had more dimensions of concern and their cancer experience highlighted the myriad challenges they faced. The affects of cancer to children for this ethnic group were not previously documented and an assessment found that the burden of caregiving and the consequences of a lack of information were greater than anticipated. Children’s experiences identified that a lack of children-centric information about the affect of cancer to them and, parental expectations in the face of illness necessitated a more assessable, attractive and sensitive information system.

A synthesis of the data contributed to the development of a “Children’s Reactive Information Seeking Behaviour – An Integrated Model” that seeks to explain the relationship between children participants’ reaction to a health situation and the subsequent processes they undergo to resolve the their state of information need.

Children constitute nearly 40% of Egypt’s population which has approached 102 million in 2021, and represent the growing majority among its poor according to UNICEF. Poverty negatively affects children’s survival and development, yet little is known about poor Egyptian children’s subjective well-being. Sharabiyya is a densely populated area in Cairo – Egypt’s capital – where a community based organization (CBO) is supporting families whose children risk losing parental care. This research studies the perceptions of well-being of 45 children aged 8-13 who are affiliated with the CBO and assesses how their relationships affect such perceptions. The exploratory study fills an empirical and methodological gap as it uses multiple participatory methods with children, thereby adding to the body of knowledge a new qualitative study on subjective well-being that focuses on children’s relationships from a strengths-based approach. Children’s mothers were also interviewed. Findings suggest that children’s quality of relatedness and perceptions of well-being are affected by kindness/tenderness, trust, joking, generosity/gifts, help/support, providing needs, snubbing/reconciliation, beating, and talking. Children’s best relationships are with mothers, siblings, people in the CBO, fathers, and friends. Children’s relationships develop with time, by sharing activities, through personal positive experience, physical proximity, and guidance from adults. Good relationships represent crucial tools for navigating difficult life circumstances in Sharabiyya and are thus intricately connected to perceptions of well-being. Most children have mixed perceptions of well-being (sometimes happy and sad at other times). The research has policy, research, and programmatic recommendations for promoting urban Egyptian children’s well-being on the national and community levels.

Early intervention (EI) programs face severe and often condemnatory critique. Some common criticisms arising within the social science literature concern the burden of moral blame that EI programs supposedly place upon parents; the use of inaccurate or misleading scientific ‘evidence’; and the absorption of children from minority or peripheral backgrounds into the dominant culture. These criticisms might be unwarranted and must be questioned. In this paper, I draw from ethnographic research conducted with ‘Preparing For Life’ (PFL), an EI program operating in Darndale, Ireland. Research with this population provides ways of responding to criticisms frequently levelled at EI. In defending this argument, I propose approaching the debate about EI from at ethical rather than a political perspective.