Contextual Research

Understanding the statistics of Orphaned and Separated Children:

India has the largest number of estimated orphans and vulnerable children in the world - 31 million. In addition, 60,000 children a year are born with HIV in India and that number continues to significantly increase.

The disquieting data is that no more than 1,600 children are up for adoption in a country with 50,000 adoptable orphans. Around 7,500 families are in queue for half of these children. The other half either have a medical problem or are more than two years old, undesirable traits for prospective Indian parents but not for many foreigners, a factor which the ministry has acknowledged by ensuring older and handicapped children move to inter-country adoption after a minimum time of 15 days for a special needs child and 30 days for a child over 5 years.

The number of adoptions in the Gujarat has gone down drastically in the past four years, and several factors including the new online adoption system of CARA is believed to be responsible for the decline. Against 175 children adopted from Gujarat in 2014-15, the number dropped to 31 in 2017-18 (till July 2017).

Ahmedabad and Gandhinagar is home to approximately 10-15 orphanages along with several government and private child care institutions for the children of diverse needs. The orphanages aim at rescuing,protecting and providing health care, education and shelter to the children.

Research:

We did extensive research in understanding different aspects related to children. We read about their development stages, their psychology, their health, their behavior, etc. Some of the notable research points are:

Piaget’s Theory:

Jean Piaget was a Swiss psychologist and genetic epistemology. He is most famously known for his theory of cognitive development that looked at how children develop intellectually throughout the course of childhood. Prior to Piaget’s theory, children were often thought of simply as mini-adults. Piaget was one of the first to identify that the way the children think is different from the way adults think.

He represented the developmental ages of children into different stages:

1. Sensorimotor Stage (0-2 yrs): At this stage sensorimotor experience plays an eminent role and the children realize that their actions can cause things to happen in the world around them.

2. Pre-operational Stage (2-7 yrs): At this stage children begin to think symbolically and learn to use words and pictures to represent objects. Children get better with language and thinking, they still tend to think about things in very concrete terms.

3. Concrete Operational Stage (7-11 yrs): At this stage children begin to thinking logically about concrete events and begin to understand the concept of conservation.

4. Formal Operational Stage (12 yrs above): At this stage the adolescent or young adult begins to think abstractly and reason about hypothetical problems. Teens begin to think more about moral, philosophical, ethical, social, and political issues that require theoretical and abstract reasoning.

Sigmund Freud’s Theory:

Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a movement that popularized the theory that unconscious motives control much behavior. He developed the psychoanalytic theory of personality development which explained the stages of development of a child through the five stages of psychological development. These stages are:

Oral (0 – 1.5 years of age): Fixation on all things oral. If not satisfactorily met there is the likelihood of developing negative oral habits or behaviors.

Anal (1.5 to 3 years of age): As indicated this stage is primarily related to developing healthy toilet training habits.

Phallic (3 – 5 year of age): The development of healthy substitutes for the sexual attraction boys and girls have toward a parent of the opposite gender.

Latency (5 – 12 years of age): The development of healthy dormant sexual feelings for the opposite sex.

Genital (12 – adulthood): All tasks from the previous four stages are integrated into the mind allowing for the onset of healthy sexual feelings and behaviors.

There are four primary developmental domains:

1. Physical Development: This domain deals with development of Gross(Large) motor skills and Fine(small) motor skills and involves teaching the children how to walk, daily physical activities, etc.

2. Intellectual Development: This domain deals with Cognitive Development, which is beyond the 3 R’s of Reading, Writing and Arithmetic.

3. Language Development: This domain deals with Phonology(rules about structure and sequence of speech and sound), Semantics(Vocabulary and how concepts are expressed through words), Grammar, etc. During first 5 years stimulation of language development is important.

4. Socio-Emotional Development: This domain deals with human bonding. Healthy attachment is essential as it provides a sense of safety and security. It also involves development of Moral Code, the ability to differentiate between acceptable and unacceptable behavior, building trust.

We targeted the domain of Socio-Emotional Development and researched further on that area.

Understanding the different contexts of development:

Developmental theory and research emphasize multiple contexts for children’s development, including families, peers, schools, and neighborhoods. These contexts are distinct from and should be assessed separately from individual child development well-being domains. For example, knowing whether or not a child is obese or exercises adequately offers a meaningful description of the child’s physical well-being. Children from homes where parents may or may not actively exercise or encourage their children to exercise represent family contexts that affect children’s development and well-being. The family’s income level also plays a role in the nutrition available to the child.

Moreover, the neighborhood and school environment play a role in determining if the child and parents are able to engage in physical activity regularly, either due to safety concerns or availability of parks and playgrounds.

Clearly, describing a child’s contexts broadly offers a more meaningful and complete way to assess the circumstances in which children are growing. Moreover, public policies directed at influencing at-risk children’s well-being are often directed at children’s contexts—the risk and protective factors in their neighborhoods, schools, parents, and the family environment. Having separate contextual indices can enable tracking, monitoring, and assessment of the implications of children’s contexts and their ultimate effect on outcomes.

Field Research:

Visit to Children Welfare Committee (CWC):

Our team visited the Children Welfare Committee. CWC was established as per the provisions of the Juvenile Justice(Care and Protection of Children) Act 2000, The CWC usually sends the child to a children’s home while the inquiry into the case is conducted for the protection of the child. The CWC meets and interviews the child to learn his/her background information and also understand the problem the child is facing. CWC consists of 5 members where one is the chairperson with work experience in the government social organisations, the other 4 members consists of lawyers, social workers, a specialist.

CWC heads the CCI’s and Children homes all over India, district wise.

After visiting the CWC and after understanding its role we decided to visit different Orphanages.

After visiting CWC and Orphanage our team decided to work for the children living at these places. We decided to work on it and went for multiple visits to the Orphanage and understood how an Orphanage functions.

Visit to Orphanage:

Our team visited the Missionaries of Charity(Nirmala Shishu Bhavan) situated in New Vadaj, Ahmedabad. We had a detailed discussion about the functioning of the Orphanage with the Head Mother of the Orphanage and the Social Worker. It helped in understanding different stakeholders associated with the Orphanage and we also understood the working of the Orphanage, which we represented in the form of Stakeholder mapping, Front-end and Back-end mapping, Core values, Customer Journey and the Service Blueprint. These charts and models enabled us to visually represent different aspects of the functioning of the Orphanage.

Insights after visiting Orphanage and C.W.C:

-The Caregivers take full care of the children throughout the day in the absence of the sisters of the orphanage also.

-There are 4 caregivers assigned in each room, two caregivers for day and night shifts.

-The caregivers help the children with all the daily activities and even accompany them to all the places that the children visit.

-The children are taken in the ambulance only for visiting any place outside the Orphanage.

-The children go for visits to other places once in a month.

-Infrastructure of the orphanage is maintained properly and is painted every year for maintaining cleanliness and hygiene.

-The financial background of the caregivers is not very strong and they are not highly educated also.

-All the staff members are paid, and they get the money from the head office in Kolkata and from donations, and the same money is used for paying electricity bills etc.

-It is observed by the sister that the children when provided with materials at times do not take care of their children as they are easily given the materials.

-Aadhaar card of the children are made with the address of the orphanage as their permanent address.

-The social worker handles and helps in administrative work and keeps a count of the children as well. The social workers are hired and paid by the orphanage. They go for meetings on behalf of the orphanage and deals with CARA (adoption related formalities and issues).

-A paediatrician comes every Sunday for check-up. The sisters are also given basic medical training to treat children and in case of severe diseases and

complications they are taken to see a doctor. A doctor for speech therapy comes 4 days per week and spends one hour every day.

-CWC hold meeting of the orphanage and the social worker is also present at those meetings. All issues are handled and discussed at those meetings.

-Extracurricular activities are not there.

Interview with Child Specialist and Social Worker:

In order to understand child psychology and current issues with the children we collaborated with Ms. Dimple (Social Worker connected with several Orphanages in Ahmedabad). The collaboration helped us further in developing various strategies which could help in development of the OSC's.

Insights after Discussion with Child Specialist and Social Worker:

-Lack of Interpersonal relationships between children of different age groups.

-Lack of constructive interaction of children with caregivers.

-No value of resources by the children.

-Main focus of the Orphanage is on the physical health and education not on mental health.

-No special activities for specially able children.

-Lack of Social Exposure.

-Lack of opportunities for these children for Societal Interaction.

Inference:

After the extensive research we figured out that gaps in the care given to these children. In the current context of Gandhinagar and Ahmedabad we learned the major gaps are around the behavioral issues of the children. So, on the primary stage the need of these children is Socio-Emotional Development (Social-emotional development includes the child’s experience, expression, and management of emotions and the ability to establish positive and rewarding relationships with others. It encompasses both intra- and interpersonal processes.

Report abuse