Parenting and Child Disability in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: Data-Driven Approaches on Open Big Data

• In Event: Poster Session 06
  In Poster Session: PS 06 Topic - Family Context & Processes

Abstract

Due to longstanding underrepresentation in research, little is known about factors that moderate parenting practices of caregivers residing in low- and middle-income countries (LMICS). Using a data-driven approach on the publicly available UNICEF Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS), we attempted to uncover the relationships between child disability and three domains of parenting strategies in terms of level of caregiving, level of discipline, and the amount of educational resources provided to the child. Within the domain of caregiving specifically, we further investigated the nature of child disability (whether intellectual disability or other disability) and its relationship with the level of cognitive and socioemotional caregiving provided to the child. Data of children and their associated families (N = 29, 525) from up to 14 different low- and middle-income countries were considered. The countries sampled are Albania, Belize, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Djibouti, Georgia, Ghana, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Mauritania, Mozambique, Suriname, Uzbekistan and Yemen. To account for the potential influence of other variables on this relationship, factors such as parental education level, gender of the child, and human development index (HDI) were included in the analysis.
Results have shown that with increasing severity of child disability, parents and especially maternal caregivers are more likely to show greater neglect in caregiving (chi^2 = 17.99; Cramer’s V = 0.086; p = 0.000066), as well as mete out harsher physical punishment (chi^2 = 17.51; Cramer’s V = 0.168; p = 0.000029). These effects are also significantly contributed by the external variables of HDI, household wealth, and in the case of caregiving, by parental education levels. On the other hand, the severity of child disability did not predict parents’ strategy in education provision, and may be better explained by variables that were not within the consideration of the present study. When examining the nature of intellectual disability as compared to other forms of disability or typically developing children in the specific domain of caregiving, results showed an increased risk of cognitive caregiving neglect among children with intellectual disabilities, compared to other forms of child disability (chi^2 = 8.72; Cramer’s V = 0.032; p = 0.003). This risk is also significantly moderated by the external variables of parental education and HDI.
An integration of the above findings suggest that both the severity and nature of child disability are significant predictors of caregivers’ eventual levels of caregiving and discipline, often through increasing the difficulty and demands of engaging with and parenting a child with disability. The significance of broad factors such as HDI, household wealth and parental education attainment in these relationships point to the unique situation in LMICs in the context of child disability where a lack of socio-economical safety nets and education raise the barriers for caregivers and parents who wish to provide adequate care for their child with disability. From these findings, we suggest that large scale policy and educational changes should be implemented within LMICs to better inform parenting strategies within the context of child disability.

Authors

• Andrea Bizzego, University of Trento, Italy
  Presenting Author

• Mengyu Lim, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
  Non-Presenting Author

• Greta Schiavon, University of Trento, Italy
  Non-Presenting Author

• Peipei Setoh, Nanyang Technological University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Giulio Gabrieli, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (IIT)
  Non-Presenting Author

• Dagmara Dimitriou, UCL Institute of Education, UK
  Non-Presenting Author

• Gianluca Esposito, University of Trento
  Non-Presenting Author