Children and youth

Immunization is a cost effective way of preventing childhood infections. WHO recommends the BCG vaccination against tuberculosis. Statistics for Kenya show that the BCG vaccine usually given at birth or at first clinical contact is high. Timeliness of a vaccine remains imperative, Studies have shown that while vaccines like the BCG may have non-specific beneficial effects, the benefits can be realized more when received on time.
This paper seeks to understand the effects of low birth weight on time to BCG vaccination
The study was carried out in an informal settlements in Nairobi, data from the Maternal and Child Health project . All women from the area who gave birth since September 2006 were enrolled in the study. Survival analysis techniques were used to assess any differences in the time taken before a child receives a BCG vaccine. A total of 4415 children were included in the analysis. Among the children with a birth weight from a card 6% were LBW. 98% of the children in the study had received a BCG vaccination.

This study investigates the effects of witnessing interparental violence among Filipino youth on their own use of violence against family members and close friends. The data source for this study was the Cebu Longitudinal Health and Nutrition Survey. Perpetration of violence against family and friends among 21-22 year old youth was assessed through 2005 self-reports, and witnessing interparental violence during childhood was assessed through 2002 reports. 14% of females and 4.5% of males perpetrated violence towards family members-only in the 12 months before the survey. About 4% and 3% of females and males, respectively, perpetrated against close friends-only. 4% of females and 3% of males perpetrated violence against both family and friends. Multinomial logistic regression analyses showed that among male young adults, witnessing interparental violence increased the risk of perpetrating violence against family members-only, and both family and friends. Witnessing reciprocal interparental violence also predicted males’ violence towards family and friends. Among females, however, witnessing interparental violence did not increase the risk of violence perpetration. Further research recommendations and programmatic implications are discussed.

Overweight and potential obesity among children in the developing world is an increasing concern as the world becomes more developed and urban (Martorell 2000, Popkin 2006, Jones-Smith 2012). Urbanization and economic development can lead to a public health paradox of concurrent under- and over-nutrition in the developing world population. While malnutrition among children remains a substantial concern, and public health priority, the implications of a simultaneous obesity disparity is not to be ignored. Studies have also suggested that the onset of child obesity lags behind that of adult obesity. This study therefore examines these trends in children and teen and adult women India, from 1992/93-2005/06, a period in which India has seen a rapid rate of urbanization and economic development. Using anthropometric data from the National Family and Health Surveys, we examine the trends and determinants of childhood and adult female obesity in a multivariate model.

Our study focuses on the impact of family environment on the health status of 10 year-old children. We distinguish physical and mental health as well as perceived and diagnosed problems. Data come from the Quebec Longitudinal Study of Child Development (QLSCD) that started collecting information in 1998 on a representative cohort of 2120 children aged 5 months. We create an indicator based on information reported by mothers and children at age ten. It consists of three mutually exclusive categories: 1) no health problem; 2) at least one perceived health problem but no diagnosed problem; 3) at least one diagnosed health problem. We use multinomial logistic regression models to assess whether the factors influencing the probability of having a diagnosed problem or a perceived problem are the same. We repeat the same model for three alternative indicators that consider either only physical health problems, only mental health problems, or both types of problems together. We include a range of risk factors drawn for family environment; some are time-invariant (e.g. age of mother at birth) others vary at each survey wave (e.g. poverty status). We expect to find that duration of poverty episodes and age at onset have different effects on perceived or diagnosed health.

Social media via Internet-enabled platforms allow youths actively consume, create and disseminate information. Without exception, services such as online social networking, micro-blogging and video-sharing have been embraced by youths in countries with widespread Internet access. Research findings suggest that youths' use of social media, be it in educational or recreational pursuits, whether with proximate peers or distant others, help to shape their sense of self. However, prior research has focused on mainstream youths rather than marginalised youth populations. To address this inadequacy, social media use of juvenile delinquents and youths-at-risk in Singapore was studied through 36 interviews with youths-at-risk, and 24 with social workers. The findings indicate that for this vulnerable youth population, social media can become a platform through which they are unwittingly drawn into criminal behaviour; and post-rehabilitation, social media may offer an insidious route to recidivism. Yet opportunities also arise for these youths’ self-determination as they can derive competence, autonomy and relatedness through their social media use. Benefits also accrue for these youths’ identity formation as they employ social media in their bid for self-discovery and self-awareness.

While a number of studies have examined the demographic processes behind Indonesia’s youth bulge, or have noted the potential consequences at a macro level, there have been no large scale studies of the political and religious views and attitudes of Indonesia’s youth bulge. In this paper we aim to shed some light on this issue using data from a recent survey of 3,006 Indonesian young adults aged 20-34 living in Greater Jakarta. The data collected a wide range of information on the religious and political views, and digital connectedness of young adults, as well as their life time aspirations and satisfaction with various aspects of their current lives. Such study is timely given the current political situation in Indonesia, a country with the largest Muslim population in the world. About twelve years following the onset of the Reform in 1998, forces of democracy continue to compete with a plethora of conservative movements promoting traditional customary laws and religious sentiments, including at one extreme, a call for an Islamic state.

The objective of this paper is to investigate the association between family, religion, religiosity, and two risk behaviors – drinking and unprotected sex – among male and female 16-17 year-old public high school students, in three municipalities of Minas Gerais, Brazil. Data come from Pesquisa Jovem (Youth Survey), a survey of students of public high schools in several municipalities in the state of Minas Gerais carried out by Cedeplar, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais between 2007 and 2010. This paper focuses specifically on senior high school students interviewed in 2010 in three municipalities: Governador Valadares, Ibirité, and Ribeirão das Neves (n=2,615 total; n=1,047 ever had sex). Although drinking is illegal for individuals younger than 18 years of age, preliminary results indicate that more than half of the students drink and, among those, ¾ do so at parties. Less than half of the students who have ever engaged in sex used a condom during their last episode of intercourse, and those who live with their mothers are more likely to have used a condom.

Three decades after the fall of the Khmer Rouge regime (KRR) in January 1979, analysis of contemporary Cambodian society can still hardly be free of references to that period. The following baby-boom induced large variations in cohort size, and the political, economic, and social context in which these cohorts transitioned to adulthood were also vastly different from that of their elders. In this paper, we analyze the transition to adulthood of those aged 12 to 24 years at the time of the 1998 census. Our objective is first to describe some of the key transitions from school to work, from parental to independent household, from single to married, and to parenthood. Within the limitations of cross-sectional data, we also make an attempt to qualify the transition to adulthood along key dimensions and to relate it to the contextual structure. Finally, we use longitudinal that might not be representative at the national level to further study the transitions from parental home to own (or marital) home.

We aim to determine whether duration of breastfeeding predicts linear growth and whether it protects against stunting and other forms of malnutrition using data from a longitudinal study conducted in two slums settlements in Nairobi, Kenya. The study involved 3,047 children aged 24 months and older, born between September 2006 and May 2010. The children were followed since birth and anthropocentric measurements including weight and height of the child taken at four-monthly intervals. The mothers were interviewed on breastfeeding practices and information updated at monthly intervals using a calendar. Preliminary analysis indicates that levels of stunting among children aged less than five years are high at 50%. A substantial proportion of children (15%) cease breastfeeding at the end of infancy. Further planned analysis using multilevel models will indicate whether the duration of breastfeeding is associated with linear growth, and whether it protects against stunting, and other forms of malnutrition.

Recently there has been a lot of discussion about whether the number of Mexican young adults not in education, employment or training (NEETS) has increased (Székely, 2011). To understand the estimates of NEETS it is important to know what they do with their time. In this article, using the 2010 Mexican Census we measure the number of Mexican NEETS by sex and place of residence (rural or urban). In order to understand how they spend their time, we use the National Survey of Time Use (ENUT, 2009) to estimate the number of hours they spend doing housework, taking care of other people and in recreational activities. We pay special attention to gender and age differences in time use. We expect young females to spend more time than their male counterparts in domestic chores and caregiving. We compare the amount of time NEETS spend in these type of chores with the time other youngsters dedicate to the same chores. We expect NEETS to spend more time in housework and care activities. Our results have implications in two directions: First, they suggest that the definition of NEETS needs to be revised, as it includes many women who are dedicated to housework. Secondly, it shows that even when many young men are not working nor in education, current data sources do not serve to completely understand what they do with their time.