Positive and negative effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on families of young children in rural Colombia and implications for child outcome research

Meagan E Williams; Madison M Berl; Elizabeth Corn; Emily Ansusinha; Margarita Arroyave-Wessel; Anqing Zhang; Carlos Cure; Sarah B Mulkey

doi:10.1111/cch.13120

Positive and negative effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on families of young children in rural Colombia and implications for child outcome research

Child Care Health Dev. 2023 Sep;49(5):825-833. doi: 10.1111/cch.13120. Epub 2023 Apr 3.

Authors

Meagan E Williams¹, Madison M Berl^{1

2}, Elizabeth Corn¹, Emily Ansusinha¹, Margarita Arroyave-Wessel¹, Anqing Zhang¹, Carlos Cure³, Sarah B Mulkey^{1

4

5}

Affiliations

¹ Children's National Hospital, Washington, District of Columbia, USA.
² Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, The George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences, Washington, District of Columbia, USA.
³ BIOMELab, Barranquilla, Colombia.
⁴ Department of Neurology, The George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences, Washington, District of Columbia, USA.
⁵ Department of Pediatrics, The George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences, Washington, District of Columbia, USA.

Abstract

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted the lives of children and families worldwide. The objective of this study is to examine exposures and impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on preschool-aged children and caregivers in the Atlántico region of Colombia.

Methods: The COVID-19 Exposure and Family Impact Scales (CEFIS) questionnaire was administered in Fall 2021 to 63 caregivers of children in Sabanalarga, Colombia enrolled in a neurodevelopment study as healthy controls. The CEFIS assesses pandemic-related exposures/events and impact; higher scores indicate greater exposure and negative impact. Descriptive and correlation analyses among exposure and impact scores were conducted.

Results: Caregivers reported a mean (standard deviation[SD]) of 11.1 (3.2) among 25 COVID-19-related exposures/events; most common types included stay-at-home orders, school closures, disruptions to living conditions and income loss. Total number of events was correlated with higher caregiver (P < .001) and child distress (P = .002). However, the mean (SD) impact score of 2.0 (0.6) suggests a trend toward more positive impact than negative. Caregivers reported improvements to sleep, exercise and family interactions. Some caregivers (n = 21) qualitatively reported negative effects including unemployment, fear/anxiety and inability to visit family, and positive effects such as unification, family closeness and spending more time with children.

Conclusions: This study highlights the importance of comprehensively exploring positive and negative impacts of COVID-19 and families' subsequent resilience and transformation. Using tools like the CEFIS, those seeking to mitigate negative impacts can contextualize data to better understand study outcomes and tailor services, resources and policy to families' unique needs. CEFIS data likely depend on timing, economic/public health resources and cultural values; future work should prioritize understanding the generalizability of CEFIS findings across samples.

Keywords: COVID-19; preschool children; public health; resilience.

Publication types

Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

COVID-19* / epidemiology
Caregivers
Child
Child, Preschool
Colombia / epidemiology
Emotions
Exercise
Humans
Pandemics

Abstract

Publication types

MeSH terms

Grants and funding