IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v18y2021i9p4530-d542754.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Assessing the Feasibility of Providing a Family Skills Intervention, “Strong Families”, for Refugee Families Residing in Reception Centers in Serbia

Author

Listed:
  • Aala El-Khani

    (Prevention, Treatment and Rehabilitation Section, Drug Prevention and Health Branch, Division of Operations, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Wagramer Strasse 5, A-1400 Vienna, Austria)

  • Karin Haar

    (Prevention, Treatment and Rehabilitation Section, Drug Prevention and Health Branch, Division of Operations, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Wagramer Strasse 5, A-1400 Vienna, Austria)

  • Milos Stojanovic

    (United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Program Office Serbia, Bulevar Zorana Djindjica 64, 11000 Belgrade, Serbia)

  • Wadih Maalouf

    (Prevention, Treatment and Rehabilitation Section, Drug Prevention and Health Branch, Division of Operations, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Wagramer Strasse 5, A-1400 Vienna, Austria)

Abstract

War exposure and forced displacement threatens the wellbeing of caregivers and their children, leaving them at risk of negative outcomes, such as elevated rates of anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. The importance of engaged, responsive and stable parenting for positive child wellbeing has been documented across diverse cultural and economic backgrounds. Despite the higher need for caregivers to be nurturing in challenging settings, they struggle to provide adequate support for their children due to lack of resources or their inability to deal with their own emotional challenges. A feasibility study was conducted of a new, open-access and light-touch family skills intervention, Strong Families (for families in humanitarian and challenged settings) on refugee families residing in Reception Centers in Serbia. Questionnaires and interviews were completed by participating caregivers and facilitators. Qualitative results indicated that the intervention was feasible to run in this humanitarian context, that caregivers viewed the intervention as culturally acceptable and complemented the quantitative results that showed promise for enhancing child behavior and family functioning tested indicators. Despite being a light intervention, Strong Families indicated improvement on child mental health, parenting practices and parent and family adjustment skills. Prioritizing family mental health and functioning as a primary need that parallels that of accessing physical medical care, sanitation and clean water must be the definitive next step in humanitarian aid.

Suggested Citation

  • Aala El-Khani & Karin Haar & Milos Stojanovic & Wadih Maalouf, 2021. "Assessing the Feasibility of Providing a Family Skills Intervention, “Strong Families”, for Refugee Families Residing in Reception Centers in Serbia," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(9), pages 1-19, April.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:9:p:4530-:d:542754
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/9/4530/pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/9/4530/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Sim, Amanda & Fazel, Mina & Bowes, Lucy & Gardner, Frances, 2018. "Pathways linking war and displacement to parenting and child adjustment: A qualitative study with Syrian refugees in Lebanon," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 200(C), pages 19-26.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Aala El-Khani & Rachel Calam & Karin Haar & Wadih Maalouf, 2022. "Bridging the Gap between the Pressing Need for Family Skills Programmes in Humanitarian Settings and Implementation," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(4), pages 1-7, February.
    2. Karin Haar & Aala El-Khani & Gelareh Mostashari & Mahdokht Hafezi & Atoosa Malek & Wadih Maalouf, 2021. "Impact of a Brief Family Skills Training Programme (“Strong Families”) on Parenting Skills, Child Psychosocial Functioning, and Resilience in Iran: A Multisite Controlled Trial," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(21), pages 1-38, October.
    3. Chansophal Mak & Elizabeth Wieling, 2022. "A Systematic Review of Evidence-Based Family Interventions for Trauma-Affected Refugees," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(15), pages 1-18, July.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Grossman, Daniel & Khalil, Umair & Ray, Arijit, 2019. "Terrorism and early childhood health outcomes: Evidence from Pakistan," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 237(C), pages 1-1.
    2. Aala El-Khani & Kim Cartwright & Wadih Maalouf & Karin Haar & Nosheen Zehra & Gökçe Çokamay-Yılmaz & Rachel Calam, 2021. "Enhancing Teaching Recovery Techniques (TRT) with Parenting Skills: RCT of TRT + Parenting with Trauma-Affected Syrian Refugees in Lebanon Utilising Remote Training with Implications for Insecure Cont," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(16), pages 1-20, August.
    3. Khraisha, Qusai & Sawalha, Lama & Hadfield, Kristin & Al-Soleiti, Majd & Dajani, Rana & Panter-Brick, Catherine, 2024. "Coparenting, mental health, and the pursuit of dignity: A systems-level analysis of refugee father-mother narratives," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 340(C).
    4. Corley, Andrew & Geiger, Keri & Glass, Nancy, 2022. "Caregiver and family-focused interventions for early adolescents affected by armed conflict: A narrative review," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 134(C).
    5. Liu, John & Mansoor, Yasmeen & Johar, Jasper & Kim, Sophia & Sidiqi, Ahmad & Kapoor, Videsh, 2020. "Strengths-based inquiry of resiliency factors among refugees in Metro Vancouver: A comparison of newly-arrived and settled refugees," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 263(C).
    6. Ilana Seff & Andrea Koris & Monica Giuffrida & Reine Ibala & Kristine Anderson & Hana Shalouf & Julianne Deitch & Lindsay Stark, 2022. "Exploring the Impact of a Family-Focused, Gender-Transformative Intervention on Adolescent Girls’ Well-Being in a Humanitarian Context," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(22), pages 1-17, November.
    7. Niveen Rizkalla & Nour K. Mallat & Rahma Arafa & Suher Adi & Laila Soudi & Steven P. Segal, 2020. "“Children Are Not Children Anymore; They Are a Lost Generation”: Adverse Physical and Mental Health Consequences on Syrian Refugee Children," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(22), pages 1-21, November.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:9:p:4530-:d:542754. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.