Dissertation Research: Socio-Ecology of Children's Provisioning Behavior in a Marginal Urban Environment

University Of Georgia Research Foundation Inc, Athens GA

Investigators

Abstract

With global modernization and urbanization, the majority of children now live in cities, many in extreme poverty. Many young children living in urban poverty must work, trade, scavenge, or beg for food and money for themselves or others. While such activities are considered inappropriate in the United States, in some other countries it is a way of life. This dissertation project by a cultural anthropologist explores how such activities influence children's health and growth under conditions of extreme urban poverty. Children who provide food or money for themselves through working, begging, or scavenging may actually have better nutrition and health, especially if they do not have to share the results of their efforts. The study will take place in the city of Xalapa, Mexico, using a sample of 110 children living at home between the ages of 8 and 12. Understanding how children cope, physically and socially, with the stressors of urban life has implications for improving child health and growth, for policy development, for the provision of appropriate and effective services for the urban poor. The new knowledge produced by the project will have specific local impacts. The research was designed in collaboration with NGOs who work with children in poverty in Mexico, and they intend to use the results to improve design and delivery of services to the urban poor. In addition, this project will promote training and experience in field research for a young medical anthropologist.