Research News

Supervised by Dr. Roquia Begum

Abstract

The present study w as attempted to assess the nature o f behavior problems o f children o f sex workers by using the Bengali version o f the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL). To investigate the behavior problems o f children o f sex workers 200 (94 boys and 106 girls) were taken as the sample. O f the total sample 75 (35 boys and 40 girls) were brothel children, 61 (24 boys and 37 girls) were institutionalized children o f brothel based sex workers and 64 (35 boys and 29 girls) were institutionalized children of street based sex workers. T heir age ranged from 6 to below 12 years. Children were divided into three age groups according to their age. Results show ed that overall 53.55% children o f sex workers have behavior problems in the clinical range. It was found that 55.3% o f boys and 51.9% o f girls have behavior problems in the clinical range. Behavior problems were found higher in children o f 10 years to below 12 years (56.9% ) and 8 years to below 10 years (56.9% ) age group than those o f 6 years to below 8 (47.1% ) years age group. Children o f brothel (62.7%) have higher behavior problems than institutionalized children of brothel based (44.3%) and street based (51.6%) sex workers. Total behavior problem scores did not vary as a function o f sex and age. Type o f children had significant effect on the behavior problem score. Significant effect was also found between the interaction o f age and type o f children. No significant interactions were found betw een sex and age, and sex and type, and sex, age and type o f children. Out o f total 118 specific individual items o f the CBCL, significant sex differences were found on 26 (22.03% ) items and age differences were found on 21 (17.80%) items. Significant differences were also found am ong three types o f sex w orker’s children on 79 (66.95%) items o f the C BCL. Behavior problem scores differed significantly on total internalizing and total externalizing scales and on depressed, somatic complaints, delinquent, aggressive subscales o f the CBCL among three types of boys. However, total behavior problem sores o f three types of boys were not significant. Significant differences were not found among three types of girls on IV Dhaka University Institutional Repository total internalizing and total externalizing scales but they differed significantly on depressed, somatic com plaints subscales o f the CBC L. Total behavior problem scores o f three types o f girls were also found significant. On total internalizing scales and on subscale of uncom m unicative, som atic complaints boys o f three age groups were differed significantly. On total internalizing and total externalizing scales o f the CBCL girls of three age groups were found to be insignificant but significant differences were found on schizoid-obsessive, delinquent, aggressive subscales o f the CBCL. On total behavior problem scores o f the C B C L boys and girls o f three age groups did not vary significantly. K now ledge o f m o th er’s status and duration o f stay at the institution had no significant effect on the behavior problem scores o f the children o f sex workers. The findings o f the present research indicate that the children of sex workers suffer from different types o f behavior problems and a large percentage o f children have behavior problem s in the clinical range. Therefore, necessary steps should be taken to remove those problems. Further research with larger sample is suggested to understand the nature o f behavior problem s o f children o f sex workers.