Child development and child rearing in Ciudad Juárez, México colonias: Economic, social, and cutural capital
Abstract
Supporting the development of healthy children is a goal for parents. Proper development becomes a challenge when children do not receive adequate health care, educational enrichment, and housing. These challenges are amplified by the continuous rise in violence in the U.S.-México border region. This study looks specifically at child development and child rearing practices in two poor colonias (neighborhoods) in Ciudad Juárez (Chihuahua, México). It relies on and extends from a project conducted by Gente a favor de gente and funded by the Paso del Norte Health Foundation. There were 2 phases in this study: a quantitative phase (N=151) conducted by Gente a favor de gente and a qualitative phase of in-depth interviews (N=16) with a photo-interview component (N=9). For the quantitative phase, parents with children between 0 to 3 years old were surveyed about their access to economic, cultural, and social capital and the child was given two tests to measure his/her current stage of development. Using the survey and results from the development tests, the analysis explores how relationships between parents' economic, cultural, and social capital and child development vary. More social capital was found to be an influence on higher development scores, with economic capital also being important. Then in the qualitative phase, we employed 16 in-depth interviews with a subset of surveyed parents to further investigate parents' access to economic, social, and cultural capitals and their child rearing practices, along with a photo-interviewing method in which a subset of 9 interviewed parents took pictures and reflected on them to complement and extend on the information gathered through in depth interviews. We found that social capital and, secondarily, economic capital were key influences on child development and child rearing practices. Differences in capital can contribute to understanding parents' experiences in child rearing in poor colonias in Ciudad Juárez (Chihuahua, México).
Subject Area
Latin American Studies|Individual & family studies|Public policy
Recommended Citation
Hernandez, Alma Angelica, "Child development and child rearing in Ciudad Juárez, México colonias: Economic, social, and cutural capital" (2011). ETD Collection for University of Texas, El Paso. AAI1494353.
https://scholarworks.utep.edu/dissertations/AAI1494353