Cargando…

The Mental Health of Children and Parents Detained on Christmas Island: Secondary Analysis of an Australian Human Rights Commission Data Set

This paper describes secondary analysis of previously unreported data collected during the 2014 Australian Human Rights Commission Inquiry into Children in Immigration Detention. The aim was to examine the mental health of asylum-seeking parents and children during prolonged immigration detention an...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autor principal: Mares, Sarah
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Harvard University Press 2016
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5395006/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28559688
_version_ 1783229808011902976
author Mares, Sarah
author_facet Mares, Sarah
author_sort Mares, Sarah
collection PubMed
description This paper describes secondary analysis of previously unreported data collected during the 2014 Australian Human Rights Commission Inquiry into Children in Immigration Detention. The aim was to examine the mental health of asylum-seeking parents and children during prolonged immigration detention and to consider the human rights implications of the findings. The average period of detention was seven months. Data includes 166 Kessler 10 Scales (K10) and 70 Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaires (SDQ) for children aged 3-17 and parental concerns about 48 infants. Extremely high rates of mental disorder in adults and children resemble clinical populations. The K10 indicated severe co-morbid depression and anxiety in 83% of adults and 85.7% of teenagers. On the SDQ, 75.7% of children had a high probability of psychiatric disorder, with lower conduct and hyperactivity scores than clinic populations. Sixty-seven percent of parents had concerns about their infant’s development. Correlations were not found between time detained or parent/child distress. Multiple human rights breaches are identified, including the right to health. This is further evidence of the profound negative consequences for adults and children of prolonged immigration detention. Methodological limitations demonstrate the practical and ethical obstacles to research with this population and the politicized implications of the findings.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-5395006
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2016
publisher Harvard University Press
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-53950062017-05-30 The Mental Health of Children and Parents Detained on Christmas Island: Secondary Analysis of an Australian Human Rights Commission Data Set Mares, Sarah Health Hum Rights Research-Article This paper describes secondary analysis of previously unreported data collected during the 2014 Australian Human Rights Commission Inquiry into Children in Immigration Detention. The aim was to examine the mental health of asylum-seeking parents and children during prolonged immigration detention and to consider the human rights implications of the findings. The average period of detention was seven months. Data includes 166 Kessler 10 Scales (K10) and 70 Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaires (SDQ) for children aged 3-17 and parental concerns about 48 infants. Extremely high rates of mental disorder in adults and children resemble clinical populations. The K10 indicated severe co-morbid depression and anxiety in 83% of adults and 85.7% of teenagers. On the SDQ, 75.7% of children had a high probability of psychiatric disorder, with lower conduct and hyperactivity scores than clinic populations. Sixty-seven percent of parents had concerns about their infant’s development. Correlations were not found between time detained or parent/child distress. Multiple human rights breaches are identified, including the right to health. This is further evidence of the profound negative consequences for adults and children of prolonged immigration detention. Methodological limitations demonstrate the practical and ethical obstacles to research with this population and the politicized implications of the findings. Harvard University Press 2016-12 /pmc/articles/PMC5395006/ /pubmed/28559688 Text en Copyright © 2016 Mares http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/), which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research-Article
Mares, Sarah
The Mental Health of Children and Parents Detained on Christmas Island: Secondary Analysis of an Australian Human Rights Commission Data Set
title The Mental Health of Children and Parents Detained on Christmas Island: Secondary Analysis of an Australian Human Rights Commission Data Set
title_full The Mental Health of Children and Parents Detained on Christmas Island: Secondary Analysis of an Australian Human Rights Commission Data Set
title_fullStr The Mental Health of Children and Parents Detained on Christmas Island: Secondary Analysis of an Australian Human Rights Commission Data Set
title_full_unstemmed The Mental Health of Children and Parents Detained on Christmas Island: Secondary Analysis of an Australian Human Rights Commission Data Set
title_short The Mental Health of Children and Parents Detained on Christmas Island: Secondary Analysis of an Australian Human Rights Commission Data Set
title_sort mental health of children and parents detained on christmas island: secondary analysis of an australian human rights commission data set
topic Research-Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5395006/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28559688
work_keys_str_mv AT maressarah thementalhealthofchildrenandparentsdetainedonchristmasislandsecondaryanalysisofanaustralianhumanrightscommissiondataset
AT maressarah mentalhealthofchildrenandparentsdetainedonchristmasislandsecondaryanalysisofanaustralianhumanrightscommissiondataset