Psychology
Risk factors are classified into the categories of social, familial, and psychological factors. Mothers that take drugs when they are pregnant risk having babies with behavior problems because the babies were exposed to drugs before they were born. A new mother will want to hold her baby and will expect to have a good experience with her infant. Instead of a positive, loving experience the mother will be faced with an infant who does not react as others who was not exposed to drugs in the womb. Her baby will not know how to react to a human face or to other stimulations in her (or his) environment. The baby will sleep most of the time or “uncontrollably crying” (Ashford & LeCroy, 2009, p. 227). The mother in turn will not be satisfied because the baby is not giving her the affection they want from the baby. The relationship between the mother and the new baby can be improved by helping the new mom understand on how to behave towards her baby. Mothers can learn how to swaddle the baby, give the baby a pacifier, and decrease the amount of stimulation in the environment around the baby.
Family risk factors can cause aggressive behaviors in school children and adolescents. Children that are living in a home where domestic violence is part of family life develop many problems. The influences on children who are present during domestic violence events and children who are victims of violence have similar symptoms (Ashford & LeCroy, 2009). The children experience depression and anxiety at higher rates than other children who do not see or experience violence. The children also carry out violent actions. They may show violent behaviors such as hurting their younger siblings and bullying classmates. Other behaviors are not physical violence but are negative behaviors just the same. The children will be observed lying and they will probably also cheat on their school lessons and tests. Bullying is one of the activities that is epidemic and several interventions are being used. Programs being applied now are designed to involve the entire school community to try to shift the school environment where bullies are comfortable (Ashford & LeCroy, 2009). Another intervention includes the larger community and implements public awareness and approaches to reduce bullying when it is happening.
Psychological risk factors in adolescents predict smoking cigarettes. A strong risk factor is when their close friends smoke (Bricker et al., 2009). No highly successful strategy is available to intervene to discourage the children from smoking Many programs to prevent young people from smoking can stop smoking for one to three years, but the children are likely to start smoking again at some point (Bricker et al., 2009). If the highest influences for taking the risk of smoking are because a child’s friends or/parents smoke, than interventions do not work well. The theory of Triadic Influence is being applied to find other psychological factors that have not been studied as much as the friend-parent connection (Bricker et al., 2009). Hopefully, an intervention will be developed that works well to decrease the risk.
Family risk factors are complex. It can be very difficult to introduce risk prevention strategies in families that may need them the most. Approaches for stopping children from smoking and stopping violence in families have not been developed. Out of the three examples, the problem of babies born after being exposed to drugs before they were born. The main emphasis needs to be on preventing taking illegal drugs. Young women need to be given reasons for not taking drugs like higher education and interesting jobs that will offer them a good profession career.
References
Ashford, J. B. & LeCroy, C. W. (2009). Human Behavior in the Social Environment: A multidimensional perspective. 4th ed. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.
Bricker JB, Rajan KB, Zalewski M, Ramey M, Peterson AV, & Andersen MR. (2009). Psychological and social risk factors in adolescent smoking transitions: A population-based longitudinal study. Health Psychol., 28(4):439-47. doi: 10.1037/a0014568.
