Child Abuse is a problem especially in the minority communities. Lets make a change.

Throughout society, there are myriads of issues that humans tend to experience and most of them do not receive the proper attention as to making an effort to put a stop to it or even attend to the factors that may cause these issues. Child Abuse is one of these issues that have been experienced and continues to be a problem that is experienced within society.  Through my research and literature review I came across the various effects of it. Not only did I come across the various effects of child abuse but I was able to come across child abuse and the effects of it on different races, White and African Americans in particular. Children who are abused, neglected, or even witness some sort of violence will experience emotional, cognitive and behavioral problems. These problems are depression, suicidal thoughts or behavior, poor performances in school, engaging in alcohol and other drug uses and even early sexual experienced. With these children accumulating all of these problems they are more likely to carry these problems into their lives while growing up. They can repeat the cycle of abuse by getting into violent relationships in their teenage years and even in their adult years.

African-American individuals have higher rates of child abuse than Whites. A big part of that issue is the lack of resources in the environment that they live in, in other words, poverty. In the areas of African- American, the factors that they experience in their economic stance only makes their living worse. Not only do they have to deal with the fact that they are poor but they have to deal with what being poor can cause. Some of these factors that are experienced by individuals are either parental, environmental and children based factors which through scholarly research was provided. The parental factors include parent has already abused a child or was abused themselves, pregnancy was not wanted, parent has a background of abuse when growing up, a young, unsupported mother often with low education, parents have unrealistic expectations of the child and lack parenting knowledge, parent is isolated and has few supports, and parent has a mental illness or is abusing drugs or alcohol. Child factors include baby is sick or unwanted, child has a physical or developmental disability, child is the product of an abusive relationship, and lack of attachment between child and parent (Vega-Lopez 2008). Environmental factors are overcrowding in the house, poverty or lack of opportunity to improve the family’s resources, family violence is present, a non- biological adult living in the house, family is experiencing multiple stresses (Hearn 2014).  Knowing these factors alone should trigger actions to be done about this sociological issue.  

Since there are such high rates in child abuse, it has caused the close connected relationship between adult and child to be difficult. In one of the articles they discussed that in work places like camps for example, how you interact with children is apart of the training aspects of the camp. Trainees are not allowed to have children sit on their lap, share the same bed, wrestle playfully, and no tickling (Rubenstein 1994). This, in my opinion, makes it extremely difficult to build a good relationship with a child. The fact that you have to think twice before handling any situations revolving a child is a bit disturbing and annoying. Children deserve to be shown affection to but due to the way affection can be shown it can be taken for something else other than you showing your care.

Media is a very important part in reaching out to society about societal issues but sometime the media does not give enough to let the audience understand and capture the full view of the issue. This also does not make it sociological because of the simple fact that it does not show the causes of the consequences (abuse). An example is the video known as Child Abuse PSA. In this video is showed the action of a mother displaying emotional and verbal abuse to her child but it did not show what caused it.  Knowing what causes these actions will help in the awareness of how serious factors contribute to the children of our society.

Child abuse affects people of all races but what I wanted to know is how to lower the high rates of poverty within the minority community. Being that I am African-American and my parents are immigrants from Ghana being less fortunate than most is something that I always dealt with. Throughout my years there has always been times where my parents have struggled to make ends meet and even though they were going through financial issues their stress from the situation never produced abusive acts. Not everyone is like my parents who found a way to cope with financial stress so helping minorities and other groups of people dealing with poverty requires action. Recovery methods might be there but we need to be able to prevent individuals from having the need to recover from an experience that is caused by poverty.

Blog Post #3

The sociological research that is relevant to my topic is 'The impact of an educational program on recognition, treatment and report or a child abuse. This journal article is information I think the public should know about because it is along the lines of educating and creating awareness on the reporting and treatment pertaining to this horrible act.  The purpose of this study was to assess the effect of a multidisciplinary educational program,  which is called Child Abuse and Neglect (CAN) prevention strategies , individuation and treatment", on knowledge, treatment and the follow-up of the physicians of  Gemilli University Hospital concerning physical, sexual abuse and neglect. Prior to the study , authors analyzed the data about patients 18 years and below who were victims of CAN  between the 1st of April and the 30th of April. Data about categories of maltreatment like physical sexual abuse and negelct, age , nationality and gender were being analyzed. Social conditions of  victims of abuse are also put into consideration  for example drug addicted parents or being in foster care. When it come to children, Pediatricians are one of the main people to identify if a child is being abused. Some physicians are not adequately trained to identify or recognize the injuries inflicted on a child. The reason as to some of them are not adequately trained is that didactic training is not mandatory to  physicians and since its not mandatory very few tend to participate in that training. This is not helping in catching the signs of abuse on a child to prevent any type of future abuse.  According to Ferrara, Gatto, Manganelli, Iannielo, Amodeo, Amato, Giardino, Chiaretti, Chiaretti (2017), there have been recent increases in recognition of  CAN as a medical problem but there is also no correlation of any improved knowledge among physicians. This sociological research is important and matters to society because it deals with children who will one day become adults  so the prevention of child abuse and early identification of abuse to a child must be accurate . Physicians should receive the mandatory training and not have an option of whether or not to take it knowing that it is an important set of tools that will benefit children. Education in child maltreatment is prevalent and should be improvements in training.

Ferrara, Pietro et al. 2017. “The impact of an educational program on recognition, treatment and report of child abuse.” Italian Journal of Pediatrics 43(1).

Blog #6

In the first picture, the structural perspective that I received by looking at it is that if you spank your child for an action done or something said that was inappropriate it is not child abuse it is a form of discipline so that the child may not do it again. "Spank" means "to strike on the buttocks with an open hand." A mission statement from the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) describes it as "striking a child with an open hand on the buttocks or extremities with the intention of modifying behavior without causing physical injury." But if you ask ten moms and dads especially from different countries they have a different perspective on what spanking means.

In the second picture, the structural perspective I received by looking at it is that they (the African parent) can view something that they also have done as something bad but they continue to do it any way. My parents are from Ghana and I can tell you that getting a spanking by the hand or by a belt is a form of discipline. If you did something wrong, if you were not serious about your studies at home, or if your room is untidy and you were told several times on what you should be doing, a beating is what you were getting. When I attended a Caribbean school the teachers had the same perspective on disciplining children and my father will also give them the permission to spank me if I was misbehaving in any way, if I missed homework, and especially if I was disrespectful.

Blog Post #5

Many sociological issues that are presented to the public are usually through popular media.  With the availability of popular media this gives individuals the access to be update on the sociological issues that are occurring around the world or simply in their neighborhood. Some of these popular media tend to focus much on who is the affected person other then the person who caused someone to be affected. In one of the articles about family issues and the effects on children, it discussed a lot about the mechanism children use to help with things going on at home. Some of the mechanisms used are tantrums and misbehavior in school. They do that to help their parent stray away from the problems they may be having whether it is marital issues or financial issues. What i dod wanna know is does the action of the child put more stress on the parents issues or does it actually help the parents with their stress.

Throughout the readings posted by my peers I do realize that there are some very controversial issues that can bring out the sociological perspectives of people especially the article about religion and sexuality. The article about the statement made by Nashville and how immoral one is if they are homosexual. This caught m attention the most because in Christianity all people should be accepted regardless of whatever the sin is. Bashing human beings, and kicking your child out of the house because of who she is regardless if it does not go with your beliefs makes you hypocritical.

There were many popular media's that were interesting to read and got my attention with their title and topic which is one thing I noticed about popular media is the eye-catching heading or title.

Blog Post #4 Child Abuse

Child abuse and child maltreatment  is when a parent or caregiver, whether through action or failing to act, causes injury, death, emotional harm or risk of serious harm to a child. There are four subtypes relating to child abuse which are physical abuse, emotional abuse, sexual abuse, and neglect. This is a serious issue given the fact that it can ruin a child's life .

Article 1. Worries About Abuse Are Changing Camps.

In this article, there are many concerns regarding new counselors at camps with children. There is fear that if one is not careful about how they act with the children of the camp there can be accusations of abuse . A structural perspective given in this article to help with the adult monitoring of kids at a camp was for individuals to be careful not to put kids in laps, tickle them, nor wrestle with them because you may be doing those very innocently  and anything can happen where you are accused of something you did not do. Trying to prevent certain accusations there has been changes in counselor training. Counselors are less warm to children and also less spontaneous with them.

Article 2. Boundary of Abuse Is Difficult To Map

In this article, it talks about what are the boundaries for certain things to be done between an adult and a child. There are certain things that certain cultures do that other cultures would find absurd. It discussed that in Scandinavian countries mixed sex and mixed age groups take saunas together in the nude but if it were to be in America there would be separate rooms for different gender  and different age groups. The article also discussed that touch is something that can accuse you of something you did not do.  The way you choose who your child can get close with in hugs and kisses. Depending on who they come into close contact with you will explain to them whether the person is a close relative or friend. The boundary of abuse varies between family in my opinion depending on who you want your child to get close with. One of the main reason parents worry about the children's interaction is with adults and other children is because of physical abuse. The structural perspective is the parent choosing how close their child should get to a certain individuals.

Article 3. A Model Child Abuse Prevention Program

In this article, the structural perspective is to give children the training to identify molesters and earn phone number off the top of their heads to help prevent the act of abuse. Children in the Tacoma schools  have been getting lessons for younger children to identify the signs of being approached by molesters. It demonstrates the appropriate touching of children's bodies so they know. This issue becomes frustrating  because it can make children afraid of their own parents to touch them and kids should be able to be touched by their parents so they can know and feel what love is. Yes children should be treated for their abuse but the abusers also need to be treated because they themselves were abused as a chlid and probably did not get the treatment that all the kids now are getting.

Activism/Acadmia/ Social Scientist .. Blog Post #2

Hey Y'all !  It time to express the sociological thoughts of Swaggy!!! After reading the collection of articles, the articles that caught my attention were "why academia and activism does not mix", "How Academics Can Become Relevant." "How Sociologist Made Themselves Irrelevant." Reading the first article I believe that academia and activism does mix. I feel like that without academia, which is the knowledge acquired, there can be no activism. Having academia can give you the topics or interest of what activist you want to become. They are both equally important in my opinion because they can help to better understand human and society. The difficulty involving both is educating the public in a sense that. Sociologist have become irrelevant in some sort which makes it difficult for them to educate the public. it will require a lot of attention seeking and much power on their side. Thinking sociologically can help with our everyday lives. Activism is said to be about the promoting of social change (Fabiorojas,2013) and since the point of activism is to bring about change I feel like academics can help with change because of the knowledge you may receive with academics in order to help with activism.

When trying to educate the public on sociological issues, sociologist tend to face roadblocks. One roadblock faced among social scientist are the fact that they can be biased. Most of the information a social scientist may present might include a lot of personal opinions which will have several audiences question why they should acquire the information coming from a social scientist. Social science should influence both debate and policy but more policy in my opinion.  It should influence debate that way the opinions of social scientist can be put out there which may help with the education of some people it just may not be guaranteed that you may win a lot of brains to think like a social scientist  but it should influence public policy because I think it would have a stronger outreach to the public in the knowledge of sociology and it could get many audiences to hear social scientists out. When it comes to anything social related in our world it would only make sense that social scientist would most likely have the answers to the "why" and "how" certain social concerns are happening and it might take time for other individuals to see it which is what  I think C. Wright Mills would say. Having a debate about this issue is not necessarily a bad thing but I feel like to a certain extent it is understood that without sociology we as human would not understand the cause and effect that happens in society and social scientist have the answers.

And that is all folks! Till next time on Swaggy Sociological Thoughts!!! 

Citations:

Jurgenson, Nathan. "How Academics Can Become Relevant." Cypborology. Retrieved September 12, 2017. (https://thesocietypages.org/cyborgology/2012/01/23/how-academics-can-become-relevant/). 


Rojas, Rubio. "why activism and academia don't mix." Orgtheory. Retrieved September 12, 2017. (https://orgtheory.wordpress.com/2013/03/31/why-activism-and-academia-dont-mix/).

 Anon. 2014. “How Sociologists Made Themselves Irrelevant.” The Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrieved September 11, 2017 (http://www.chronicle.com/article/How-Sociologists-Made/150249/).

Sociology and how you might use it!

In my life, I grew up  around law and criminal aspects of life and the world because of my father. In Ghana my father was apart of an intelligence group known as BNI (Bureau of National Investigations ) and he would tell me all his stories when he was working in the unit. I became so interested in that life regardless of how dangerous some of his stories were. Every time he will be watching television it would either be on the News, Forensic Files,  Jeopardy, or anything pertaining to his field of interest. Through all of this, including my fathers stories, I became interested in the field of Criminal Justice and Sociology because I found it really interesting on how to solve certain crimes that a human committed and wondering why they made the decision to do this certain crime and also learning how an individual came up with a plan to execute the crime.  

I would define sociology as the study of the social life, changes, causes and consequences of human behaviors with the analysis of the communication between individuals as to the world. Sociological perspective is the point of view you have on human behavior and its connection to the world. Sociology is useful in the sense that it helps us understand  not only other people but ourselves, culture, and environment. It also helps us understand the world and why individual do what they do or think the way they think which can help me with my future endeavors. I plan on attending law school hopefully to get to the FBI. With the use of sociology, it may help with knowing why my client is in a given situation and it will also help with how I preset my case before the judge. Within the FBI sociology is a starting tool in solving crimes. The benefits of a sociological perspective is learning what other people think on the topic of sociology. It may help strengthening your understanding because of another individuals view it can also be used outside the academic walls in a sense of maybe understanding your friends personal issues with, for example, dating like why you chose certain individuals or why you are attracted to a certain individual and with that you maybe able to give great advice.