Investigation of the emotional status of asylum seeking children from Syria, during the transitional period of their stay in Greece, in 2017.

Postgraduate Thesis uoadl:2760962 343 Read counter

Unit:
ΠΜΣ Κλινική Παιδιατρική και Νοσηλευτική - Έρευνα
Library of the School of Health Sciences
Deposit date:
2018-05-24
Year:
2018
Author:
Theodoraki Angeliki
Supervisors info:
Ιωάννης Κουτελέκος, Καθηγητής, Τμήμα Νοσηλευτικής, ΤΕΙ Αθήνας
Χρυσάνθη Τζουμάκα-Μπακούλα, Καθηγήτρια, Ιατρική, ΕΚΠΑ
Ευγενία Βλάχου, Αναπλ. Καθηγήτρια, Τμήμα Νοσηλευτικής, ΤΕΙ Αθήνας
Original Title:
Διερεύνηση συναισθηματικής κατάστασης παιδιών από τη Συρία, αιτούντων άσυλο κατά τη μεταβατική περίοδο της παραμονής τους στην Ελλάδα, 2017.
Languages:
Greek
Translated title:
Investigation of the emotional status of asylum seeking children from Syria, during the transitional period of their stay in Greece, in 2017.
Summary:
Introduction: The Syrian civil war began in March 2011, but Greece experienced the impact of these events with the first waves of refugees that began to arrive by thousands on the islands in order to make a leap to salvation. Amongst the thousands of refugees, the most vulnerable group, children, sought security, protection, meeting basic needs, smooth integration into the temporary hospitality society, psychological support and physical care when needed. Helping and supporting war children is perhaps one of the biggest challenges for the host country as a transition to permanent resettlement. This must be taken into account by all health professionals and competent bodies who are involved, because multi-faceted needs and multiple psycho-social factors are affecting the physical and mental stability of refugee children.
Purpose: The purpose of this study is to identify the main emotions experienced by children in this transition stage and test their interaction with children’s difficulties in the sphere of emotion and behavior. Also the collection of demographic data that can contribute to the detection of significant relationships.
Material and Methods: A total of 104 children / adolescents and 104 parents from different parts of Greece participated in the study, while temporarily being housed in structures in Athens awaiting their relocation to European Union countries through the facilities of the International Organization for Migration (IOM). IOM gave the consent in order to collect data. For the purposes of investigating the desirable factors, SDQ questionnaire was used in Arabic language as well as a new multidimensional questionnaire addressing the feelings and thoughts of children and adolescents. Also a demographic and health status questionnaire. The statistical analysis was performed with the SPSS statistical packet and the statistical significance level was set to <0.05.
Results: Our sample consists of 57.7% of boys and 42.3% of girls with an average age of 12 years. The majority of children are in Athens accompanied by both of their parents (81.7%). Most children live with their families in hostels with apartments (65.4%) and hotels (23.1%) while they are in Athens for an average of 2 months period.
A percentage of children of 48.08% is within abnormal limits for Emotional Symptoms, Peer Problems (PP), Conduct Problems (CP), and ProSocial Problems (PB) of the SDQ, with corresponding percentages : 50%, 85.5% & 100% of abnormal behaviors. Hyperactivity (HP) is recorded as the only factor of problematic behavior in which the average of children had scores which rank them within normal behaviors by a percentage of 61.5%. The above reflects parents' beliefs about the problems and difficulties of their children. Through Thoughts and Emotions Scale, the study found that most of the children experience the feelings of security, nostalgia and satisfaction at high levels, and the feeling of optimism at universally high prices. The feeling of annoyance is the one that ranks at low levels on average, concluding by this that respondents are experiencing low levels of discomfort while staying in Greece.
Studying the correlations between the two questionnaires and the socio-demographic factors of children-adolescents, statistically significant relationships were observed. Parents expressed that their boys had statistically higher ratings of ES (p =0,002), CP (p = 0.000), PP (p = 0.003), HP (p = 0.003) and TDS (p = 0.000). Girls expressed statistically significant higher levels of satisfaction factor (p = 0.004), nostalgia factor (p = 0.001) and discomfort factor(p = 0.000). Smaller children were found, through their parent’s report, with statistically significant higher scores in Emotional Symptoms and Conduct Problems with p <0.05, while older children and adolescents reported statistically significant higher levels of emotional factors of safety, nostalgia, satisfaction, and discomfort with p <0.05. Children / adolescents who lived with their families in refugee camps showed statistically significant lower expression of the emotional satisfaction factor with p = 0.013. Children and adolescents whose lives were at risk during their trip to Greece were correlated with statistically significant higher expression of Emotional Symptoms (p = 0.02) as well as expression of their overall score of difficulties (p = 0.013) through their parents report.
Subsequently, studying the correlations between the two questionnaires (SDQ&TEQ), statistically significant relationships were shown as well: Statistically negative correlations were found between the satisfaction factor of TEQ and (p <0,05) factors of ES, CP, PB and TDS of SDQ. Emotional factor of disturbance correlated negatively and significantly with HP, PP, and TDS factors of SDQ (p
<0.05). Emotional factor of nostalgia correlated negatively and significantly with all SDQ sub-scales including the TDS (p <0.05). Emotional factor of safety correlated negatively and significantly with ES, CP, PP, HP, PB and TDS factors of SDQ (p<0,05). The Emotional factor of optimism was correlated significantly only with hyperactivity factor of SDQ with p = 0.05.
Conclusions: Children of refugee families in Greece face several difficulties with their psycho-emotional and behavioral problems. Difficulties experienced in the country of temporary residence (Greece) vary according to their thoughts and feelings as well as the social factors they experience there. Health professionals, in order to optimize the mental health of these children, have to take into consideration the significance of their feelings, aiming at appropriate interventions.
Main subject category:
Health Sciences
Keywords:
Emotional profile, Children's emotional development, Children & traumatic life events, Greece & Syrian refugees, Emotional problems in children & adolescents.
Index:
No
Number of index pages:
0
Contains images:
Yes
Number of references:
180
Number of pages:
271
File:
File access is restricted.

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