Effects Of Poverty On Human Development

Poverty - A child may be living in a household with a very low income and their family may not be able to afford to provide for their children as they ad hoped. They may struggle to buy enough food, especially health food, to eat, buy clothes to wear or even to provide heating and electric. This can affect their physical and mental health due to poor hygiene and diet. Some children may suffer with low self-esteem and low self-respect because of the stigma attached to poverty, this can affect them in later life also.

As mentioned by Ruane and Cerulo in Second Thoughts, harsh realities of poverty affect children’s lives in profound ways. Children lack any power in improving their circumstances and depend on adults to gain access to basic necessities. Access to proper healthcare, education, and basic nutrition continues to be an obstacle for children. Poverty impedes children’s aptitude to learn and contributes to poor overall health and mental health. Perhaps most important, poverty becomes a cyclical nature that is difficult to overcome. Children who experience poverty when they are young tend to experience persistent poverty over the course of their entire lives. According to the Child Welfare League of America, the national poverty rate for children

Living in poverty has a wide range of negative effects on the physical and mental health and well being of individuals (apa.com). Hunger, child development, risk of infectious disease, low social mobility, inadequate and affordable housing, economic isolation, homelessness, lack of education and information, unemployment, violence, health issues, drugs and drug use are some of the effects of poverty in society. All of the characteristics of poverty are devastating but some are more complex than others. In my opinion, the major problems are crime, education, housing, unemployment, and the lack of food. I think that some of the affects of poverty can cause other problems to arise. For example, when individuals live in inadequate homes (roaches and rats everywhere, no clean running water, and there’s mold everywhere) living in unsanitary conditions can cause disease and other health

Economic insecurity can create other serious consequences on mental health, such as; Personality and mood disorders, Psychoses that can lead to suicide and many other behavioral problems that make individuals turn to incautious choices like criminality and violence. According to the article “Education, Poverty and Terrorism: Is There a Causal Connection?” individuals living in poverty are more likely to do irrational things due to the financial pressure they’re on, the feeling of hopelessness can trigger some unsettling emotional response that can incur in aggressiveness and other acts of

According to cliffnotes, there are different types of poverty; absolute poverty: the lack of access to the minimum food and shelter that is necessary for maintaining life; relative poverty: the poor who earns less than half of the nation median income, so they tend lack what is necessary to live decently; feminization of poverty: a number of single women who live in poverty alone, mainly as single mothers; and cultural poverty: where nothing can be done to change their economic outcomes. There are so many serious effects from poverty, but children are known to be affected the most. It is shown that children who grow up in poverty are more likely to suffer from more persistent, frequent, and severe health problems, than those children who grow up in a better financial circumstances and environment

They are also more apt to have anxiety, low self-esteem, and depression. Children living in poverty are at risk for various amounts of health problems. It is sad that the children born into poverty don’t have a chance to be successful. Adults are affected by poverty in numerous ways. Poverty leads to divorce, which further leads to pitiful parenting. Adults may become insecure, or envious of friends or family who are making more money. They may start stealing money, because they have so little. The effects of poverty are major on adults and children. Adults might even commit suicide, because they feel like they have failed in life and think that his or her family won’t love them anymore.

Children in poverty are more at risk for conditions indicative of future disability, such as

One huge cause of illness is poverty. Poverty plays such a huge role in the health of individuals because to be healthy you must have the necessary resources available to maintain health, such as nutritious food and safe shelter. Not having healthy food directly impacts health by often causing malnourishment and obesity. Individuals in poverty often

Poverty causes most stress within households and has an impact on the healthy development of a child.

The psychological health of children around the world is detrimental to their abilities to cope, succeed and be able to function normally within social settings. According to Evans and Shamberg ( 2009), “Chronically elevated physiological stress is a plausible model for how poverty could get into the brain and eventually interfere with achievement” (p. 6545- 6549). Children residing in poverty stricken neighborhoods and families tend to experience environmental stressors as well as physical stressors such as educational setbacks, lack of resources and physical demands that are not being met. These stressors can cause a problem in the psychological health of children because of the need to continually adjust to changes and setbacks that stem from poverty.

Again, just living in poverty areas increases health issues and mortality due to health issues. Children raised in poverty in substandard homes located in high-crime areas have an increased chance of cognitive deficiencies, depression, or some other mental disorder (Anakwenze & Zuberi, 2013, p. 149). The children are the future; with this being said, an ugly cycle of poverty continues to be reinforced with each generation. Breaking the cycle with community outreach programs, increased mental health awareness, increased employment, and increased educational benefits for those in need are a few things that could potential help. As the old saying goes, “Give a Man a Fish, and You Feed Him for a Day. Teach a Man To Fish, and You Feed Him for a Lifetime” (Author unknown). Unfortunately, there is no right or easy answer for poverty but, I believe education is the key.

Health is another issue that has been examined as a potential effect of living in poverty. A large amount of literature links low income to child health problems with studies showing that children in poverty are at a greater risk of infant, child and adolescent deaths (Children’s Defense Fund, 1994) along with malnutrition (Miller & Korenman, 1994) and numerous other health issues. These health issues can also be linked to the low quality living environment, as children in poverty are more likely to be exposed to toxins such as lead along with poorer air and water quality. These have been found to lead to cognitive deficits in children (Holgate, Samet, Koren, & Maynard, 1999).

Poverty for centuries has been a very severe issue that has troubled many nations while impeding economic developments and progress. Poverty stricken countries are majorly concentrated in the continents of Africa and Asia. Continents like the Americas and Europe have globally been recognized as been wealthier yet still many parts of these ostensible countries face massive cases of poverty. Most at times, countries with high populations owing to high birth rates face the most cases of poverty. The definition of poverty can be boundless in the sense that poverty entails so many subsections as it sometimes gets complicated to group everything under one umbrella. Society tends to focus more on the tangible aspects of poverty because many people associate poverty with lacking money and it makes sense because poverty in terms of lacking money is a major problem affecting almost every country in the world. Even though it is debatable that poverty can be physical, intellectual, spiritual and even emotional, it is best to talk about the lack of money and economic developments in this essay. With reference to the oxford English Dictionary, poverty is state of being extremely poor and the state of being inferior in quality or insufficient in amount. Reflecting on this definition given, I deduced that malnutrition and hunger can define poverty. In the light of this, I think poverty is lacking a comfortable place of shelter, being ill and not having access to a better

Poverty can lead to serious effects. Children who grow up in poverty are likely to have frequent health problems than the children who grow in better financial circumstances. For example, infants who are born into poverty have a low birth weight, and they grow up with mental or physical disabilities. Not only are they sick, but they are most likely to die before their first birthday. Children who are raised in poverty might miss school often because of their illnesses, and they have a much higher accident rate than the other children. Nearly a billion of the world’s population can’t read nor write. Poor families experience stress much more than a normal family does. They are more likely to be exposed to negative events such as illness, job loss, death of a family member, and depression. Homelessness is another effect of poverty. Homeless children are less likely to receive proper nutrition, protection and they experience more health problems. Around 1.4 million children die each year from lack of access to safe and clean water and proper nutrition. Homeless women experience a high rate of low birth weight infants as well as miscarriages. Families who do not have homes receive much more stress than other families. They also have disruption in school, work, friendships, and family relationships. There are other effects of poverty such as drug abuse and addiction, child and woman abuse, debts pressure, and increase in crimes.

Poverty brings several things with it that increase the infant’s risk to physical, emotional, and cognitive harm. The infants and children raised in poverty are less likely to receive basic medical treatment. Untreated illnesses can have lifelong effect on a child. Poverty is a generational issue and often times the mothers has not been taught basic play and interaction skills with their newborn from their mother. It is rare that one moves beyond their scope of life experience. Poverty is one of the risk factors that have additional consequences that accompany it. The families are more likely to live in substandard conditions that expose the infant to environmental risks such as contaminated drinking water and lead. Additional stressors during this stage are financial stressors and depression among the infant’s caregiver. These issues can lead to ignoring of the infant’s emotional needs and the infant misses the opportunity to create a lifelong bond with another and trust in another being able to meet their needs. Inadequate parenting can occur over a child’s entire life span with different and yet still devastating results. As stated in by Hutchinson in her book Dimensions of Human Behavior, Changing the Life Course (2008):