Psychological Effects Of Poverty On Children

Children who live in shelters may be at a higher risk of developing mental health issues as a result of environmental factors like poverty, unstable home life caused by abusive methods of discipline, and improper care from those around them. The effects of poverty have a very significant impact on a child's overall well-being, academics, and behavior. Children and adolescents suffer the highest rates of poverty out of any age group in modern day America. Children that have been raised in poverty-stricken environments are at a higher risk for behavior problems because they are more likely to be living in neighborhoods where there are very limited positive role models for them to look up to. This can cause issues in their later years of adulthood.

Lansford et al, 2002). Studies centered around child abuse have shown that the emotional distress caused during the time they were abused often follows them into their later years of adulthood. During childhood years, however, the biggest causation of abuse was the overuse of physical and emotional punishment instead of a strongly implemented rewards system during discipline. Though rewards are commonly used in school systems to encourage good behavior in children, the most common form of discipline in households are punishments. Because of this, the abuse, often found in the overuse of punishments such as coercion, public humiliation, spanking or other types of physical harming, time out or confinement, and yelling, can have long term effect and are more likely leave emotional

To contribute to the psychological growth of children, parents can also be evaluated for the upbringing of their child and how their actions affect the different levels of their child’s core development system. Parents, being the most influential factor in the contribution to a child’s behavior during growth, closely monitor and filter behavior into what they consider wrong and right through different means of discipline. Discipline like this can be easily separated into two categories: reward, and punishment. Punishment, when used as a primary form of discipline, can hinder the cognitive development of their children. This can produce a psychological turmoil within the child and often leads to several forms of depression and anxiety