How Disability and Other Socio-Economic Factors Matter to Children’s Socio-Emotional Outcomes: Results from a Longitudinal Study Conducted in Ireland

Abstract

Children with disabilities experience significantly poorer socio-emotional outcomes than their peers without disabilities. However, research evidence is scarce about children with both disability and migration background, the group which this study aimed to investigate using data from a national longitudinal study. Secondary data analyses were conducted on a sample of 7290 children (weighted with missing values imputed). Significant differences in socio-emotional outcomes were found in relation to impairment status but not in relation to migration. Having an impairment and activity limitation significantly increased the likelihood of experiencing poorer socio-emotional outcomes over time. Our findings highlight a higher risk of socio-emotional problems among children with disabilities, especially among children from lower income backgrounds and with parents with lower educational attainment. These findings clearly require policy development on two fronts: to raise professional and community awareness on these issues and to strengthen the capacity of health, education and social care systems to support schools, families, and communities.

Social-Emotional Difficulties in Irish Children Aged Five and Nine Years: A National, Longitudinal Study

“…This is further confirmation of the significant influences on children's social and emotional development. Moreover the pattern of odds ratio associated with SDQ thresholds replicates those reported previously for another cohort of Irish children aged 9 and 13 years with respect to children's impairments, lower education of primary caregivers and higher scores on conflicted relationship but not for child's gender which was not a significant contributor to the models in this cohort [13]. Past studies in other countries and with similar aged samples have also noted the strong association between children's developmental impairments and social-emotional difficulties [4].…”

“…These relationships broadly replicate those reported by Swift et al [13] for changes in SDQ thresholds for children aged 9 to 13.…”

“…Of particular concern are the children who continued to have above threshold scores at both ages-2.9% of the sample-and over 2000 nationally. This is exactly the same percentage of children who were reported to have maintained above threshold scores in an earlier cohort of Irish children from ages 9 to 13 years [13]. As noted above, it could be that the children's ratings may have fluctuated between the ages of 5 through to 13 but even so this data would suggest that any interim improvement does not appear to be stable.…”

“…The SDQ is a widely used, brief (25 item) screening questionnaire designed to assess emotional health and problem behaviours in children It has reasonable reliabilities and validity especially for the total scores [13,15,16]. A total score is calculated based on four of the five subscales with a threshold score of 17 and above (out of a possible 40) as 'abnormal' and requiring further investigation [12].…”

“…One of the few studies undertaken with nationally representative samples of children took place in Ireland with a cohort of over 7500 children at age 9 and again at age 13 [13]. Parental ratings on the Strengths and Difficulties questionnaire identified 7% of nine-year olds as having above the threshold scores indicative of probable diagnostic significance which had declined slightly to 6.3% at age 13.…”