Chapter 8: Effects of poverty on development HL

Question 1

Brooks-Gunn and Duncan (1997)

Answer 1

Identified groups of outcomes of poverty:
- Physical health: stunting, nutritional health status.
- Cognitive ability: can lead to developmental delays.
- School achievement: certain predictors of completion of school.
- Emotional and behavioral outcomes: emotional and behavioral problems, be they externalized (aggression) or internalized (depression).
Also outlines pathways through which poverty operates:
-Health and nutrition
-The home environment
-Parental interactions with children
-Parental mental health
-Neighborhood conditions

Question 2

The family Stress theory

Answer 2

stresses the influence of parental interactions with children, the home environment, and similar factors as the main causes of children’s deprivation.

Question 3

The investment model

Answer 3

low income leads to fewer opportunities and as such less ability to provide children with stuff. The economic situation and income as opposed to the family’s influence is stressed.

Question 4

Dickerson and Popli (2016)

Answer 4

Sampled 19000 children from the UK. Differentiated episodic and persistent poverty. Interviews with children every two years, three times. The results showed that the children that experienced poverty scored worse on cognitive development tests. It also found that the timing of poverty played a crucial role for the results of the test. The most recent episode of poverty had the least impact, whereas the earliest had the biggest impact. The earlier the poverty, the worse the effects. Evaluation: we do not know which variables influenced the results.

Question 5

Costello et al (2003): The Great Smoky Mountains study

Answer 5

Natural longitudinal study. Sampled 1500 rural children aged 9-13 and did annual psychiatric assessments for the course of 8 years. One quarter of the sample was Native American, the rest mostly white. Halfway through the study, a casino opened which somehow provided the poor an income supplement that increased annually. Some from the poor group changed to the ex-poor, whereas 53% remained in persistent poverty. Psychiatric symptoms were compared in the never poor, persistently poor and ex-poor children in the four years before and after the casino opened. Results showed that for the four years before the casino opened the persistently poor and ex-poor children had more psychiatric symptoms than never poor children. However, in the four years after the casino opened the psychiatric symptoms among the ex-poor children dropped to the level of never poor children. At the same time, levels of psychiatric symptoms among persistently poor children remained high. Evaluation: again, it is difficult to isolate the variables.