New project to explore impact of poverty on children's mental health
Poverty has a clear impact on the mental health of children, but when and how it happens is still unknown. A new research project, led by Lisa Harber-Aschan, will fill in the knowledge gaps using unique data sources and innovative methods.
Lisa Harber-Aschan. Photo: Alma Kirlic
The goal is to shed light on three central questions: When during childhood is children's mental health affected by poverty? What factors drive these effects? And how do these effects differ between children of migrants and children of non-migrants?
The research project will also examine the extent to which psychosocial stress and parents' mental health can explain the connection between poverty and children's mental well-being. In addition, the researchers will study how the children's mental health is affected when parents manage to overcome long-term poverty.
To find the answer to these questions, the researchers will analyse long-term data from early in the children's lives, between the ages of 5-25 years. In particular, they will look at differences regarding gender, parents' country of birth and the reasons for migration.
The project "Poverty and mental illness in children of migrants - a longitudinal study of inequalities and key mechanisms" has received SEK 6,887,000 from Forte and will last for four years.
Lisa Harber-Aschan will lead an interdisciplinary research group on the project, which consists of Stefanie Möllborn, Siddartha Aradhya, Anthony Matthews, Raffaele Grotti and Sol Juárez.
The Department of Sociology is home to the Stockholm University Demography Unit (SUDA), an international group of scholars and doctoral students, working on many facets of population dynamics. It offers a Master’s program in Demography and a PhD program in Sociological Demography.
