Psychological Profile of abused children and intervention scholastic achievement

Abstract

The study was undertaken during 2003-05 with the objectives to study family background, prevalence and factors related to types of child abuse, adjustment, perception newlineabout parenting and its relationship with adjustment, level of learning abilities and impact of intervention on learning abilities among institutionalized children. The population comprised 150 children residing in four juvenile institutions of Belgaum division in Karnataka state of which 148 children who were neglected, physically newlineand multiply abused were selected for detailed study. Background information was collected newlineusing questionnaire. Information about social, emotional, educational adjustments of children newlineand their perception about different parenting models was collected using Sinha and Singh (1997) and Bhardwaj (1998) scales respectively. Learning abilities and academic newlineperformance of children was collected from teachers and school registers. School based newlineintervention programs for staff members and children were carried out. Intervention for newlinechildren focused on improving their learning abilities and this was done by using intervention package. Pre and post assessment about learning difficulties was made using NIMHAN S Index II (Kapur et al., 1991). newlineThe results revealed that prevalence of neglect was highest among institutional newlinechildren. Incidence of neglect was higher among girls, while physical and multiple abuse were more among boys. Significant association was found between caste, family size, family structure, alcoholic habit of father and types of child abuse. Majority of children had newlineunsatisfactory adjustment in social, emotional, educational areas. Majority of children perceived that their parents had rejecting attitude towards them, careless about them and indulgent in their interpersonal relationships. Positive relationship was observed between children perception about different parenting models and their adjustment. Further, 39.19 per cent of children were poor in reading, 21.62 per cent poor in writing and 46.62 per cent poor newline