Impact of Refugee Status on Children - Research Proposal Example

IMPACT OF REFUGEE STATUS ON CHILDREN Introduction Being a refugee is hard enough on adults so it must be hard on the children who have to move to a new place and make new friends altogether every time they move. Refugees are people who move from their original country of residence to another because of famine, war or draught. Every time they move from one place to another they make friends, they attend schools with other children, meaning that thy make friends and relationships. When they move, these relationships are broken and they are disrupted in their day to day lives. Most children of refugees hope that whenever they move to a new place, they will be moving to a better place where they can have their own rooms and the facilities that the Norwegian children enjoy (Archambault 2012). Children are a special category of refugees and they have been ignored or not considered when carrying out research among refugees. They consist of more than a third of all the refugees’ population yet they have never really been studied. Some of the changes that children are required to make are moving to new houses, making new friends, changing schools and changing houses (Archambault 2012). The parents of the Norwegian refugees have to learn the language first so that they can get jobs and move to where the rest of the citizens live. The frequent moving keeps the hope alive that they will at some point move to the permanent residence. Some of the items they hope to own to consider themselves well off include a washing machine and a decent bathing area. Living in congested areas may make them vulnerable to diseases such as cholera and dysentery. Congestion in the refugee camps makes transmission and outbreaks of diseases very easy. Children are more likely to die from such diseases and therefore they have to be treated with more care. It is necessary that children are taken care of and understood so that their needs can be met. In this case, as refugees, the needs of children are not met and hence the move from one area to another from time to time. Moving from time to time disrupts the normal running of things (Robb 2014). For instance, they have to make new friends, they have to get used to new neighbors and new neighborhoods and they have to learn to take care of themselves and their families. Lastly, the paper will be important to other researchers as they investigate issues concerning children and the impact of moving from one place to another on children. The reviewed literature on the issue of refugee status indicate that children suffer both mentally and physically when they have to keep moving from one place to another before they can get permanent residence. They also suffer socially as they cannot make any long lasting friendships and this makes them have to start from scratch in the socialization process once again. The paper will also be important to civil rights groups who deal with the issues of refugees and those who are concerned with the welfare of the children of the refugees ( Clark 2014). References Alison Clark, R. F. 2014. Understanding Research with Children and Young People. New York: Sage. Archambault, J. 2012. It Can be Good There too. Childrens Geographies, 35-48. Clark, A. 2007. Early childhood spaces: Involving young children and practitioners in the design process. Working Paper . The Hague, The Netherlands: Bernard van Leer Foundation. Methodology proposal Sample The paper will target peer reviewed journal and websites to get information about the issue to get as much information on violence in children. Data that will be reviewed include data from the year 1985. This is because it is an on-going phenomenon and trends have to be noted. The way that people think and the way they react to situations have also changed adversely. Refugees have been suffering for quite a long time and solutions have to be found if they are to live comfortably. They suffer in their residential areas not to mention lack of peace of mi d running away from their countries (Clark 2007). Another source of information would be from the teachers, parents and students themselves. There will be 25 teachers, students and parents who will be chosen randomly at the biggest school in the refugee areas. The list of students will be obtained from the teachers and so will the list of parents. From the parents, there should be a family that has both parents, a single parent, a legal guardian who is not a parent of a child, maybe a foster parent or relative. The parents do not have to be parents of the chosen students. As long as they are parents, then they are qualified. Students will be chosen from the age-groups of 8-16. At this age, children are able to read and write properly. They can also understand issues and be able to tell their feeling openly. They can also understand the issue that is investigated and respond accordingly (Moss, 2005). At this stage they have awareness over what is happening and also have formed opinions of their own so they can be able to state their own opinions and not those of their parents or guardians. Getting what they feel about the issue is also very important as they are also innocent and say things as they see them rather than sugar-coat the issues. As a researcher, one should get the real information as it is on the ground rather than sugar-coated information as this would be a false representation of the issue at hand (Pascal 1997). Furthermore, adults provide insights on how children adapt to the frequent movement and how they react to the new environments. They will be given questionnaires which they can answer anonymously. Data collection tools Books, journals and magazines will be very instrumental in collection of information and data on the children of the refugees. The questionnaire that will be used in the biggest school in the area will consist of open ended and close-ended questions and will have four parts. The first section will be about their demographical information. The demographic information includes their ages, sex and the places that they come from and their social status in the society. Information to be included is also the number of members in the family and their nature of the jobs they do if they are parents. The respondents will have no obligation to reveal their names but if they wish to do so then they would still remain protected. They could also be asked of their gender and the role each one of the members plays in the family. This information is required since it contributes to the understanding of violence in the respondent. This section will also include questions as to how many times they have moved since they came into the country and how far they are in the settlement program (Clark 2014). The second section will be awareness of factors affecting children of the refugees and how they are identified. This part will seek to know if the respondents know of any changes in behaviour or physical changes that refugee children undergo. Parents and children will have options of ticking boxes of what affects the children the most. The third section will be concerned with understanding the effects of frequent moving from one place to another. At this point, the respondents will be asked if they know the effects of refugee status and if they have experienced them and what it makes them feel (Clark 2014). The last section would be the recommendation they propose in terms of faster settlement in permanent areas and what facilities they would like in those houses. At this point, the respondents will also be asked whether they plan on returning to their country or if they plan on living there their whole lives. Data analysis For all the information to be gathered will be analysed and summarised then used conclusively for the information. All the literature that has been read contains real information of what is happening. The newspapers also have valuable information about refugee children. They contain information on how they suffer. When they just get in the country, they lack basic things and most of the time could die from the cold, hunger for lack of food and lack of security. Children suffer a lot when they become refugees. They lose the things that they were used to back at home and they have to get used to strangers. This makes them lose their pride as they have to rely on strangers for everything (Archambault 2012). There is also the issue of language barrier. They find it very hard to communicate with the people therefore, making their lives even harder than it already is. The information gathered from the questionnaire will be presented in the form of graphs. Presenting data in graphs give a more precise conclusion of the study. It helps in understanding the study much easier especially to the common population who are not used to understanding such things. Furthermore graphs are professional and tell the results of the study in a short and precise manner (Pascal 1997). Means will be computed to find out the number of respondents who have experienced hunger, those who have slept out in the cold, those who have moved more than five times, those who have been stolen from for lack of security and finally those who would like to go back to their countries. It is necessary to come up with such precise methods and numbers to have a trues representation of what the people feel and what could be improved and what could remain the way that it is. Deviations, mode, percentile and means will be computed so that it is easier to identify the figures. All the figures will be presented in tabular forms and in graphs. Research has shown that people remember more easily if information is presented to them in the form of pictures and graphs. People have a short attention span and would rather interpret graphs and tables rather than read volumes and volumes of literature. Presenting information in a tabular form gives more credibility to the study and makes more and more people interested. It summarises the entire research on a figure and this is a very positive thing. Time frame This paper will be done in a period of not less than 8 weeks. The paper has to be given enough time as this is a very complex issue. There is no point in rushing through the research since this may make the researcher get less information than what they need. Rushing through the process may also make the researcher make a biased decision about the issue. He will not be able to collect as much information as he needs from the people that he needs. It is common knowledge that anything that is done in a rush can never be done well and it is important as a researcher that one takes as much time as is allowed to conduct a feasible and conclusive study with all the correct parameters (Clark 2014). The first two weeks, the researcher will be concerned with the literature review. They will conduct in depth analysis of the literature that is available. From the literature review, the researcher will hopefully obtain the various forms of effects on the child and what they hope for. The effects on the child could be in the form of mental. Since they are unable to have peace in their lives which keep getting disrupted, their development gets affected and they may refrain from making friends since they know that they will have to leave them anyway. Hey obtain some coping mechanism which may be classified as anti-social. The physical effect on the children is evident in their malnourished bodies. They rarely get a balanced diet and have to eat what comes regardless of whether it is healthy or not. They feel that they do not belong since it is evident they are not treated the same way that the citizens of the country are treated. They are always reminded that they are refugees and that they do not belong. They feel that the country is doing them a favour by allowing them to live in the country. The next four weeks will be dedicated to surveying. This includes getting data from the parents, children and teachers. The researcher has to identify the population that is most suitable to be interviewed and this has to be the people who will be able to spare some time for the interviews or the questionnaire. They also have to be willing to fill the questionnaire but the researcher has to decide whether they will be allowed to go home with them or if they would need to fill them immediately and return them. The last two weeks of the research will be dedicated to the analysis of the information that has been collected. This is where the researcher interprets the findings and presents them either in a graph or in a tabular manner. The researcher has the option of presenting it in any way that is best suited for him and those who intend to use the research for future purposes. Ethics Since the researcher in this case is a student, he will need to get verification from the university to get authorization to interview children on this matter. This is the only way he will be allowed to conduct the research. Even if the researcher is not a student, they will have to get verification from the concerned body as it is considered illegal to interview people or subject them to a study without the consent of the concerned authorities (Clark 2007). Furthermore, people would not agree to be interviewed if the person is a stranger and cannot explain where they are from clearly. The world that we live in is very dangerous and one could easily be sued for extracting information from other people for their own benefit. It is also important to get authorization from the parents where children are concerned. Therefore, the researcher should get permission from either the police department or the mayor of the particular state and if it is a student, they should obtain permission from their universities. Then in cases of minors, they should get permission from their parents. Everything should be done in a legal and in a systematic manner. The other ethical consideration to consider is the issue of questionnaires and the wish of the respondents to remain anonymous. If the respondent wishes to remain anonymous, then the researcher has the duty to make sure that their identity is not revealed at any point. Revealing such issues could lead to the destruction of the career of the researcher. Furthermore, they could be placing the life of the respondent in danger. If the activities of the researcher are likely to place the life of the respondent in danger, then the researcher should find an alternate. Under no circumstances should the researcher place the life of the respondent in danger for whatever reason. Life is precious, much more precious than any kind of information. References Archambault, J. 2012. It Can be Good There too. Childrens Geographies, 35-48. Christine P., &. T. 199). Effective Early Learning: Case Studies in Improvement. New York: Sage. Clark, A. 2007. Early childhood spaces: Involving young children and practitioners in the design process. Working Paper . The Hague, The Netherlands: Bernard van Leer Foundation. Moss, A. C. 2005. Spaces to Play: More Listening to Young Children Using the Mosaic Approach. New York: NCB for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Evaluation of the potential relevance of your proposed study Introduction Because of moving from one place to another from time to time, the children do not feel that they belong. Every time they get settled in an area, they have to move to another place and this makes them feel that they have no place to call their own. As long as they have not obtained permanent residence, then it follows that they do not have a place they can call home for the rest of their lives (Clark 2007). The homes that they move into do not necessarily belong to them but rather, the government which decides on the sizes of the houses, the location of the houses and even the people who will live in a particular neighbourhood. They do not have the sense of belonging that the children of Norwegian origin enjoy. The study will be helpful in trying to find ways of improving the lives of the refugees and what can be done to make their lives much easier. Evaluation of the significance and limitations of the proposed study The significance of this study is to make people aware of the problem that children of the refugees go through. It makes the people see the sufferings they endure so that the can push the relevant authorities to make the situation better for them. Even though they are refugees, they are people who have feelings and suffer the same way that the refugees suffer. Therefore, they should be treated as human beings, the same way the other citizens are treated. The major limitation of this study is that the people move from place to place and they do not have a permanent place to stay and therefore a researcher may not be able to interview he same set of people each time they go there (Moss 2005). Besides different refugees have different things that they want. While some may enjoy just the peace of mind from whatever they run away from home for, other would like to enjoy the finer things in life. Dissemination plans The research will be disseminated in schools. In schools, it will be much easier to explain the effects of migration on children. Teachers could then pass this information to the parents and explain to them the consequences of the movements and even provide coping mechanisms for the children and how they help their children deal with their refugee status. Since this is an issue that regards children, the research could also be distributed to civil organisations that deal with the issue of children who could in turn hold talks in schools on better methods of helping children of the refugees. Civil organisations also push the government to help the refugees faster; they are the voice of the refugees (Strategies for Disseminating Research Findings 2009). Through them, action is taken much faster. The results of the study could also be given to the organisations that deal with the refugees and those who help them to live more comfortably by providing them with basic amenities and ensuring that their rights are not abused (Moss 2005). Conclusion In conclusion, the children who look forward to having better places to live in should be able to have faster access to them so that they can settle much sooner and have a better sense of belonging. The government or the policy makers should make the procedures better and faster so that the refugees can settle much faster as well. References Strategies for Disseminating Research Findings. (2009, February 2). Retrieved August 13, 2014, from Yale Centre for Clinical Investigation: http://www.yale.edu/bioethics/contribute_documents/CARE_Dissemination_Strategies_FINAL_eversion.pdf Moss, A. C. (2005). Spaces to Play: More Listening to Young Children Using the Mosaic Approach. New York: NCB for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Read More