Raised in refuge: A comparison of developmental contexts and adaptation among the children of resettled refugees and voluntary migrants

Abstract

Many adult refugees flee war and oppression primarily to secure a better future, peace and freedom for their children. However, even the minority who are offered a place in a country of resettlement often find that the future for them and their children is limited by poverty, acculturation stress, discrimination and their past exposure to traumatic events. This study aimed to identify unique characteristics of developmental contexts and outcomes for the young children of refugees by comparing data for children of forced and voluntary migrants in a large nationally representative database in Australia. The Longitudinal Study of Australian Children traces the development of two cohorts, infants and preschool-age children, every two years. This paper focuses on data collected from both cohorts when children were aged 4 to 6 years. It compares young children whose parents were born in Non-English speaking refugee source countries with those whose parents were bon in Non-English speaking immigrant source countries. Information about children’s developmental context and their social and emotional problems were obtained from parents and preschool/school teachers using the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire. Teachers also reported on preschool/school adjustment using the Student-Teacher Relationship Scale. Children of forced migrants were more likely than children in other groups to experience disadvantage in several dimensions of their developmental context. Outcome variables differed in the extent to which parents’ migration status explained independent variance in outcomes. Parent- and teacher-reports showed that both groups of children were resilience on some dimensions of development.