- YUSUFF SHUKURAT WURA Domestic Violence is the physical, mental, intimidating behavior and sexual or any other abuse by one person ...
- YUSUFF SHUKURAT WURA
Domestic Violence is the physical, mental,
intimidating behavior and sexual or any other abuse by one person against
another person in a domestic setting, such as in marriage or cohabitation. So
many people think domestic violence in marriage involves only the couple.
Little do we know that there is a third party who bears the burden for
witnessing domestic violence throughout his\her life even if it is just a day
experience .Witnessing domestic violence
at a tender age surpasses just the immediate effect it could have on a
child; it is a lifetime experience.
According to research by scientists, "Witnessing
abuse carries the same risk of harm to a child as being abused directly".
Kessler, a professor of health care policy at Harvard Medical School and a
co-director of the World Health Organization's World Mental Health Survey
Initiative confirmed that witnessing domestic violence create scars that get
reopened when exposed to traumas in adulthood.
Witnessing domestic violence has
an adverse effect on a child’s overall functioning such as increased display of
aggressive behavior, poor academic functioning, emotional problem and low level
of social competence.
Every child’s mind is like a ‘tabula rasa’-a
blank slate that is waiting to be written on, and nothing would appear on it
except that which is written there. The family as the first agent of
socialization affects a child’s behavior to the largest extent. Telling a child
what to do is not the only basis of learning; 70 percent of a child’s behavior
is affected by what he/she is exposed in his/her surroundings.
A child's exposure
to seeing nothing than hostility in the home will affects how he relates with
other people in the larger society. This is because of what he/she sees on a
daily basis.
There
are multiple cases of children who are quick
to hitting their peers at school because they see and believe that violence is
an acceptable behavior that accompanies any sort of disagreement between
people.
A child who witnesses domestic violence often display aggressive
behavior towards people; it feels like the right thing to do as it has been
pictured in his/her mind and brain. According to a study by researchers from
the university of Washington and Indiana University; " Children who are
exposed to violence in the home engaged in higher levels of physical bullying
than those who were not exposed to violence.." A child imitate whatever it
is he/she sees her primary caregiver doimg because he/she is attuned and
observant of all what goes on in the household. It is of no surprise when a
child displays affection such as holding hands, kissing and hugging in public
because he/she is always seeing her parent do the same in the house.
Furthermore
, witnessing domestic violence also tend to affect a child’s academic behavior.
A child who is exposed to domestic violence often demonstrates lower school
achievement and poorer adaptation to the academic environment. Researchers have
linked exposure to domestic violence and abuse with lower IQ scores, poorer
language skills, decrements in visual-motor integration skills and problems
with attention and memory.
Domestic violence paints a picture that is difficult
to erase in a child’s mind thereby making such a child lose focus on the
central requirements of academic achievements such as encoding, organizing, recalling
and expressing understanding of new information. A child who witnesseses domestic
violence is likely to fall asleep in school due to lack of sleep at home
because he/she might have spent the night listening to or witnessing violence.
Comparing
further, scenes of domestic violence replay almost every day in a child’s head
like a movie and due to the fact that such a scene is not appealing, it becomes
a cog in the wheel of such a child’s academic performance. The kind of
environment a child lives in determines his/her attitude to academic
activities; more reason teachers call the attention of parents to any change in
their child’s academic performance.
In addition, a child who witnesses domestic
violence has a high likelihood of having emotional problems. A key component of
social competence is emotional processing which includes emotion perception,
communication, interpretation and regulation of emotion. However, emotional
problems may ensue in different patterns such as anxiety, fear of abandonment, having
conflicting feeling towards people, isolation from people, poor problem solving
skills and trust issues amongst others because they do not have the foundation
of safety and security that is normally provided by the family.
These emotional
problems often result in fear for the future thereby having problem with being
emotionally attached with anyone.
Such a child will believe that every
relationship is full of conflict and abuse. He/she will prefer to keep feelings
to his/herself rather than sharing with anyone and this may result in having
problem choosing a marital partner. The trauma of the experience makes he/she
fear that his/her marriage will also be like that of his/her parent.
A male
child who had witnessed domestic violence will eventually grow up to be an
abuser himself. In the same vein, a girl child who had witnessed domestic
violence may tend to be clingy and always have the fear of being abused.
Another
effect of witnessing domestic violence on a child is having low level of social
competence. Every child needs social competence for successful adaptation to
the society. Social competence is used to describe a child’s social
effectiveness and ability to establish and maintain high quality and mutually
satisfying relationships.
A child who already has problem on communicating
feelings to people and relating due to experience from domestic violence will
surely have issues on being competent socially. It should be noted, however,
that social competence goes a long way in detecting the skills and talent of a
child. A child that cannot express him/herself will surely have problem
discovering who he/she really is. Whereas it is through self discovery that one
can determine what one can do to effect positive change in oneself, in people
and the society at large.
Just as Tanja Jovanic said; " Domestic
violence eliminates the buffering effect of another positive adult because the
adult who is targeted can’t provide comfort to the children who witness it”.
Parents are expected to be the protector of a child against the world but by
exposing such a child to domestic violence, they deny the child the benefit of
a happy childhood and a better future. This act is nothing but ‘betrayal’ by
someone who is supposed to be a source of protection.
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