Growing up in exile: Mental health and meaning making among indigenous Guatemalan refugee children in Chiapas, Mexico.

Abstract

This study utilized both quantitative and qualitative methods to assess the mental health and psychosocial development of 58 Guatemalan Mayan Indian children living in two refugee camps in the Mexican state of Chiapas. Data are presented which indicate minimal evidence of psychological trauma, as well as generally low levels of other types of psychological distress. Several factors are suggested to explain these findings, including "the recreation of normality" within the context of the refugee camps. Data are also reported which describe a moderate relationship between children's mental health and the physical and emotional well-being of their mothers. A strong association was found between depressive symptomatology in girls, but not boys, and physical and psychological distress in their mothers. It is suggested that girls may experience a greater level of vulnerability to the impact of their mothers' distress due to a developmental norm according to which boys, as they grow older, spend increasingly greater amounts of time outside of the home working with their fathers and other adult relatives in the fields, while girls remain at home assisting their mothers with a wide variety of household chores. Qualitative data are examined which are based on semi-structured interviews, drawings, and creative arts workshops conducted with a sub-sample of 40 children in the two camps. While the interviews addressed a broad range of developmental and phenomenological themes, the focus of the qualitative analysis in this dissertation concerns the ways in which the children have come to make sense of their experience of exile. Specific topics discussed include children's understandings of why their families fled Guatemala, the nature and causes of the violence, and their thoughts and feelings regarding the prospect of returning to Guatemala at some future point. The dissertation concludes with a summary of the major findings of the study, and examines the limitations of conceptualizing mental health strictly in terms of the absence of psychiatric symptomatology. A more holistic definition of mental health is advocated, in which children's competencies are taken into account.