Essay On The Effects Of Poverty On Children's Health

Effect of Poverty on Children’s Health Poverty has always had a momentous effect on society. It causes grief to all ages, but specifically the young. In the May/ June publication of American Psychologist, Hirokzu Yoshikawa from Harvard University, J. Lawrence Aber from New York University, and William R. Beardslee from Harvard Medical School and Boston Children’s Hospital published an article on the effects of poverty on the mental health of children and youth. Each author contributed with their own work, as well as the research of several accredited specialists in their fields. The article goes into detail, the definitions of poverty in the United States as well as the research that has been conducted on the effects of poverty on mental, emotional, and behavior health (M-E-B), the framework that defines what constitutes someone to be considered poor, reviews on literature on mechanisms that contribute to the M-E-B health of children, and describes strategies to reduce and prevent the poverty as well as its associated effects. The authors inform the reader of a brief background of poverty and focuses largely on …show more content…
The article discusses certain examples accurately of the harm poverty inflicts on children, but it does not take into account families that are making an effort to support their children’s mental health despite financial standings. The article also explains several different studies and experiments conducted to improve poverty. Although some of the study results were indeed an improvement on the effects of poverty, the amount of money contributed did not equal to the percentage of improvement that were listed to be considered a great success. The agenda of the article is to gain support of the programs available to improve conditions in poverty. The research of the article is thorough and believed to support the author’s