Parenting in Direct Provision: Parents' Perspectives Regarding Stresses and Supports

Parenting in place: The reception centre as the spatial context for laying the foundations for asylum-seeking children's healthy development

Brain architecture is shaped by early childhood experiences, which thus affect future physical and mental health. These experiences consist primarily of parenting, intertwined with environment. The mental health of migrants has received much attention in research; however, early childhood experiences and the spatiality of parenting have largely been ignored. This study examines asylum-seeking parents' perceptions of parenting their 2-6-year-old children, focusing on the spatial context of the reception centre. We conducted 26 semi-structured interviews among parents in three reception centres in Finland. The results show that parenting was challenged by all three dimensions of place: location, locale and sense of place. The findings indicate that for parents, the reception centre is an essential factor interacting with parenting, enabling or impeding caregiving. These findings are discussed from the viewpoints of transnationalism, insufficient children's spaces and activities and lost sense of place. We urge policy-makers to improve the spatial context for parenting in reception centres by ensuring adequate children's spaces and activities, including opportunities for early learning, privacy of the family, parents' social support and possibilities for establishing everyday routines. We suggest that these improvements would have far-reaching beneficial implications for the healthy development and future mental health of asylum-seeking children.

'This is not what I want for my children': agency and parenting in Danish asylum centres

Background

Children of asylum-seeking families constitute a particularly vulnerable group, and there is growing interest in understanding how asylum-seeking parents can be supported to safeguard the health, wellbeing and growth of their children. In this study, we examine the capabilities of asylum-seeking parents to act on the support and advice provided by child health nurses in Danish asylum centres.

Methods

We draw on semi-structured qualitative interviews with 11 asylum-seeking families (corresponding to 15 parents) living in two asylum centres run by the Danish Red Cross.

Results

The findings illustrate that asylum-seeking parents’ agentic capabilities to take care of their children are tightly constrained by their housing constrictions and living conditions, insufficient money allowances, regular relocations and juridical status as asylum-seekers. These physical and organizational structures and the pervasive uncertainty related to being asylum-seekers inhibited parents from acting on advice from child health nurses, and from providing their children with a safe, healthy and stable environment.

Conclusions

Asylum-seeking parents face the task of taking care of their children within particular physical, organizational and juridical structures, which tightly constrain their ability to parent their children well, or to follow advice provided by child health nurses.

Negotiating identities and social representations through intergroup contact in a community solidarity initiative

In Ireland, displaced people experience segregation, discrimination, and disempowering regulations within the Direct Provision system. Community solidarity initiatives (CSI) aim to address the segregation and discrimination displaced people face through collaborative contact with residents/nationals of Ireland. However, asymmetric power relations mean that residents/nationals and displaced people are likely to experience intergroup contact differently, which has implications for identity negotiation. We investigated how displaced people and residents/nationals negotiated their identities and oriented to social representations in talk about their experiences of a CSI in the West of Ireland. We interviewed 17 displaced people and residents/nationals and conducted a thematic analysis, informed by Social Identity Approach and Social Representations Theory. Then, we applied a discursive approach to understand how participants constructed social identities and social representations. Our analysis produced two main themes: 'Identity negotiation strategies in talk about intergroup contact' and 'Understanding and orienting to intergroup boundaries'. We found that residents/nationals and displaced people negotiated their identities to maintain positive identification in relation to negative social representations about their groups. Participants also oriented to shared group representations in their talk , which has implications for the development of political solidarity between residents/nationals and displaced people.

Migrant families with children in Montreal, Canada and transnational family support: a protocol for a focused ethnography

INTRODUCTION

There is a gap in research regarding transnational family support (emotional, practical, spiritual, informational and financial) as a resource for migrant families with children. From the perspective of migrant families and their family back home, the objectives of this study are to (1) identify the types and ways that transnational family support is provided to migrant families in Canada; (2) assess for patterns in the data that may suggest variations in the nature of this support (eg, by migration status, time in Canada, children's ages, family circumstances) and over time and (3) explore the impact (positive and negative) in receiving and providing transnational support, respectively.

METHODS AND ANALYSIS

A focused ethnography is planned. We will recruit 25-35 migrant families with children with different migration histories (eg, economic or forced migration from a mix of countries) and family circumstances (eg, single parenthood, families living with extended family, families with children in the home country) living in Montreal, Canada. Families will be recruited through community organisations. Data will be gathered via semistructured interviews. To capture the perspective of those providing support, family members in the home country for each migrant family will also be recruited and interviewed through communication technology (eg, WhatsApp). Data collection will also involve observation of 'transnational interactions' between family members in Montreal and those back home. Data will be thematically analysed and results reported in a narrative form with an in-depth description of each theme.

ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION

Ethical approval was obtained from the sciences and health research ethics committee at the University of Montreal. Study results will be shared through traditional forums (publication, conference presentations) and via other knowledge dissemination/exchange activities (eg, 'lunch and learn conferences' and seminars) through the research team's research centres and networks to reach front-line care-providers who interface directly with migrant families.

A literature review of the psychological status of asylum-seeking children: implications for nursing practice

Europe is in the midst of a large-scale migration crisis, which has implications for healthcare provision for asylum-seeking children and families. The authors set out to identify the psychological status of asylum-seeking children and highlight their needs. A search of three electronic databases was carried out, resulting in 15 studies. Data show that asylum-seeking children appear to experience many mental health difficulties, including post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, self-harm, sleep disturbance and behavioural difficulties. The daily living situation includes a range of psychological stressors, such as lack of space and control; fear of deportation; feelings of inadequacy and hopelessness; poor parental mental health; lack of recreational facilities; communication issues; and financial worries. Since many asylum-seeking children have experienced past trauma, hospitalisation and healthcare encounters may trigger traumatic memories and cause further distress. Awareness of the psychological impact of the situation on children and families may help nurses to provide empathetic, sensitive and culturally competent care.

Food as a Biopower Means of Control: The Use of Food in Asylum Regimes

States struggle to maintain a facade of sovereignty against the large-scale migration of immigrants and asylum seekers, who are trying to find their way into the receiving societies. Increased borders control, reinforced socio-legal boundaries and detention facilities are some of the constant efforts' states employ to quell the immigration of asylum seekers and control their presence. Disciplinary power often appears in a centralized form, such as borders and immigration systems, but also in decentralized, dispersed forms, ranging from medical practices, media and market influences, as well as many others, which were termed by Foucault as biopower. This force - which in its broad meaning describes deliberate attempts to interfere with the essential human existence and manage all spheres of life - is defined by Foucault as a ‘political power [that] had assigned itself the task of administering life’. Biopower is employed to manage, regulate and govern lives, produce obedience, and subordinate individuals and communities to disciplinary practices. The control over lives should be understood comprehensively, so that includes ‘a life of the city…political life, economic life…’ as well as ‘the management of … money … information, communication, water, sheep, grain …’. Accordingly, we argue that food is a form of biopower, an apparatus utilized to control and govern asylum-seekers. We posit that the state uses food to monitor the individuals' well-being, the community life, and affect the social existence. In this article, “food” refers to the role sustenance plays in providing nutrition and reinforcing socio-cultural values.

Refugees, asylum-seekers and undocumented migrants and the experience of parenthood: a synthesis of the qualitative literature

OBJECTIVE

To synthesize the recent qualitative literature and identify the integrative themes describing the parenthood experiences of refugees, asylum-seekers and undocumented migrants.

METHODS

We searched seven online databases for the period January 2006 to February 2017. We included English and French published peer-reviewed articles and graduate-level dissertations, which qualitatively examined the parenthood experiences of refugees, asylum-seekers and undocumented migrants. We summarized study characteristics and performed a thematic analysis across the studies.

RESULTS

One hundred thirty eight studies met inclusion criteria. All but three were conducted in high-income countries, mainly in the US. Migrants studied were mostly undocumented from Latin America and refugees from Sub-Saharan Africa. Almost all studies (93%) included mothers; about half (47%) included fathers; very few (5%) included extended family members. We identified three integrative themes: 1) experiencing hardship and/or loss in the context of precarious migration and past traumas; 2) building resilience and strength by bridging language, norms and expectations; and 3) living transnationally: obligations, challenges and resources. Each theme contributed to shaping the parenthood experience; the transnationalism theme intersected with the themes on hardship and loss and resilience and strength.

CONCLUSION

More research is needed with fathers, extended family members, asylum-seekers and in the LMIC context. A transnational lens needs to be applied to programs, policies and future research for refugee, asylum-seeker and undocumented migrant parents. Addressing transnational concerns (family separation and reunification), acknowledging transnational resources, fostering a transnational family identity and conducting transnational and longitudinal studies are potentially pivotal approaches for this sub-population of parents.