The impact of community and political violence on children in Northern Ireland and Israel

• Main Author: Ellis, Kate
• Published: University of Ulster 2009
• Subjects: 303.60835
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.554240

The following body of work consists of 4 studies examining the impact of community and political violence on children in Northern Ireland and Israel. The first study is an examination of mother's reports of their children's experiences and examines a number of factors including social identity, emotional security as well as emotional and behavioural adjustment. The first phase of the study involved conducting four focus groups in Belfast to guide the construction of two measures of sectarian and non sectarian anti social behaviour in Northern Ireland. The second phase then involved the administration of the questionnaire battery to mothers living in Londonderry with at least one child under the age of 17 years old. The second study was an investigation into children's experiences of political and community violence carried out with a sample of school children aged 15-18 years old living in Belfast and Londonderry. The study examined the impact of exposure on outcomes such as emotional and behavioural adjustment and depressive symptomology. This was a quantitative study of children's self reports. The third study was a replication of the Northern Irish school study with Israeli children. All measures were translated into Hebrew in order to allow a cross cultural comparison of two countries experiencing varying levels of political conflict. Finally, an investigation of the psychometric properties of the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (Good man, 1996). Both the Northern Irish sample and the Israeli sample responses were examined and a comparison made of the different factor structures obtained through factor analysis.