Effects of Psychosocial Intervention on the Level of Stress of School- aged Children who Experienced Displacement in Marawi City, Philippines

Abstract

This study was steer primarily to determine the effect of psychosocial intervention to the level of stress of school-aged children who experienced displacement in Sarimanok Area (Site 1) that housed 100 families who originally own real properties located in the ground zero.

There were randomly selected 38 displaced children – 7-12 years old involved in this study and were exposed to 13 sessions of psychosocial intervention. Selection of the participants was based on the following criteria: (a) experiences of war atrocities and experience of being a displaced child during the war in Marawi City; and, (b) obstructions and prevention of return to original homes despite the end of war. Exclusion criteria were lack of war experiences because they left Marawi City with their families before the war started and spent the whole war period in other areas and children who are professionally diagnosed with physical and psychiatric problems. This study utilized three questionnaires in gathering data from subjects enrolled in the experimental groups using structured interview. On pre-assessment period, Questionnaire 1 which dealt on the basic personal and socio-demographical data and Questionnaire 2 which was an adopted 26-item self-report questionnaire of children’s stress symptom scale designed by Sharrer and Ryan Wenger, were used in the interview. During post-assessment, Questionnaire 2 was utilized for a second time including the Questionnaire 3 that was focusing on the children’s feelings before and after participating the psychosocial interventions.

The results of this study suggested that there was a statistically significant difference between the level of stress perceived by the displaced school-aged children in the pre-test and post-test. This finding suggests that participation in the various psychological interventions may have reduced the levels of the children’s stress level associated with displacement. Future studies should focus on strengthening interventions for displaced children who are vulnerable to harmful effects of stress.