Risks Of Children In Poverty

Submitted By biggdaddyspence
Words: 1464
Pages: 6
Open Document
Risks of Children in Poverty
Spencer McNeil
Texas A&M University – Commerce

RISKS OF CHILDREN OF POVERTY
Poverty is a complicated thing within our world, and trying to figure out all the causes of it tends to be even more difficult. A lot of people believe that poor people cause their own poverty, because they believe that in every circumstance ‘anything is possible’ but in all cases this couldn’t be any further from the truth. I feel as though one of the real problems is they are usually uneducated people so they are usually forced to work minimum wage jobs and a lot of times minimum wage is just not enough to support an entire family. Another problem that could be is debt; some people do not start in poverty but end up there because of medical bills for health conditions they could not control. There is no one reason for the problem that is poverty but there are many risks that are associated with it and especially when it comes to the case of speaking on children.

All children are at risk just because they are young and dependent on others for their survival in the world, but children that live in poverty are at even more of a risk. It has been well established that early exposure to poverty is linked to children’s future functioning along multiple domains, including behavior problems (Linver, Brooks-Gunn, & Kohen, 2002), self-regulatory skills (Raver, Blair, Willoughby, & The Family Life Project Key Investigators, 2013), and academic performance (Duncan & Brooks-Gunn, 1997; Duncan, Yeung, Brooks-Gunn, & Smith, 1998). According to past research there is a clear negative connection between poverty and children’s brain development. These children do not have all of the things they need to succeed from an early age. As we learned in class, parent child connection is one of the most basic and essential things a young child needs, and sadly in most cases of poverty the parent is not involved or is too stressed or tired to be involved in a positive way. It is hard imagining a child being able to go through such circumstances and still survive and become a healthy contributing part of society. In one of my counseling classes we spoke of poverty and it is thought that more than 16 million children are living in poverty, which is nearly 22 percent of all children and of that nearly 6 million of those children were under the age of 6. Such young children are easily influenced by the living situations and environments and most never are able to recover from the experiences that had during the poverty.

Poverty and risk are unequally distributed across racial and ethnic groups in the United States. Greater proportions of African American (35%) and Latino (31%) children live in poverty than White (11%) and Asian (15%) children (Wight, Chau, & Aratani, 2010). In addition, family risk factors are more prevalent among racial/ethnic minority families than White families (Hatch & Dohrenwend, 2007; Kilmer, Cowen, Wyman, Work, & Magnus, 1998). In this study African American and Latino have the highest percentage of children in poverty but the outcomes of the adult tend to differ. Children living in poverty that are African American and Latino that only have one parent in the household tend to have less problems as adults than do white children. This was very interesting because it showed that poverty was different among race and ethnicity, which I did not expect to see because I assumed all children behavior was pretty generalized and universal. Different cultures all raise their children a lot differently, that could be the reason for why there is a difference between all of the races and ethnicities.

One of the major risks of children in poverty is illiteracy. These children most likely do not attend any type of school on a regular basis and if they do attend school the school is likely to not be a very good school. According to Department for Education statistics, by the end of primary school, pupils receiving free school meals
Show More

Related Documents: Risks Of Children In Poverty

Main Poverty Line Essay

What is poverty * Extreme poverty is the severe lack of material possessions or money. In 2005 the World Bank defined extreme poverty as living on less than US$1.25 a day. This meant living on the equivalent of US$1.25 a day, in the US, buying US goods. In 2011, this means surviving on the equivalent to US$1.50 or £1 per day. This graph shows the proportion of world population in extreme poverty 1981–2008 according to the World Bank This graph shows the proportion of world population in extreme…

Words 1612 - Pages 7

Childhood Poverty In The United States

world, but yet poverty still exists here. Childhood poverty affects every aspect of their life. Poverty is not having income for basic needs, food, housing, clothing. Poverty is a crisis that deserves attention from everyone. Poverty has many faces, but it’s an invisible problem and their voice is seldom heard. Who are the Poor? The poor are people who lack money and resources for needs. Poor families have a diverse background and circumstance in life that can result in poverty. Statistics show…

Words 343 - Pages 2

The Resiliency Of Sonia Sotomayor Essay

dreams are sometimes far out of reach for America’s poor. The recession in 2008 brought about the single largest increase in childhood poverty and in 2011, a total of 15.1 million children were living in poverty (Ceballo, 2014a). Of those, a higher number of racial and ethnic minority children live in poverty, and a higher percentage of all children in poverty are from single parent homes (Ceballo, 2014a). Accoriding to Zolkoski & Bullock (2012), those of African American or Hispanic decent are…

Words 1319 - Pages 6

Liberal Reforms

with poverty? In the 1850s the British Government had a laissez-faire attitude towards poverty and believed in the policy of self-help. However, after the Liberal Party won the General Election of 1906, it adopted a more interventionist approach and introduced a number of measures to help the poorest British citizens. Historians continue to debate how successful the Liberal reforms were in tackling the problems associated with poverty. This essay will focus on the problem of poverty in children…

Words 1213 - Pages 5

Ethics In Social Work

giving individual therapy. Rather working on the micro, mezzo, or macro level, service providers are required to stick to a professional code of ethics, which includes the core values of social work. For the research I will be conducting on childhood poverty ethics and values are a key of importance. Service to others is one of the fundamental values in social work. Social workers recognize that serving others is more essential than self-interest and put the requirements of their clients before of their…

Words 565 - Pages 3

Baby Scholars Best Final Essay

University Abstract The Baby Scholars program is a program which targets at-risk children in the Grand Rapids area by providing effective educational opportunities from infancy until the age of five. The children considered at risk generally live within four zones in the greater Grand Rapids area. These areas are generally affected by poverty and other socioeconomic and environmental factors. The children and families that qualify for enrollment in the program endure living situations that…

Words 2752 - Pages 12

Director: Poverty and Schools Essay

As schools face public demands for increased student performance, the daunting task is particularly problematic for schools with high poverty levels. Traditionally, achievement is associated with high parental education and high income, while children in lower socio-economic status, often termed at-risk, show lower test scores (Payne). While the decline in achievement gains has been documented in many different studies, schools face the additional developmental issues associated with the well-being…

Words 1824 - Pages 8

Demographic Analysis Sample

percent poverty rate among the Carlisle people. I feel that there is a health risk with this information because the people that are in poverty are unable to have proper health care, they possibly will not have food, they are not able to keep up with house expenses and will be unable to keep their house up to code. These people might have jobs but they are minimum wage paying jobs are not completely ideal for people that have children in the house. A lot of these people that are in poverty are not…

Words 515 - Pages 3

Cyp 3.1 Explain The Importance Of Child Protection

safeguarding children and young people encompasses a variety of different factors including family circumstances, poverty, and cultural practices. Looking at family circumstances, a parent or main care givers health both mentally and physically can impact the safety of a young person or child. Struggling parents with mental or physical illnesses may struggle to meet the needs of the child or young person. Also parents with substance misuse, domestic violence and so on may neglect their children, and their…

Words 892 - Pages 4

chapter 2 review Essay

Poverty is defined as the state of being extremely poor. In the US about every one in seven persons are poor. Rachel Sheffield and Robert Rector1 say Nearly 47 million persons are considered poor. There definition of poverty is “The word “poverty” suggests near destitution: an inability to provide nutritious food, clothing, and reasonable shelter for one’s family”. 1 Though many Americans aren’t this bad off poverty is still a major issue in the US. Poverty affects essentially everyone…

Words 474 - Pages 2