TACKLE EARLY CHILDHOOD DEPRESSION EFFECTIVELY
What you need to know:
- At times, parents are even involved in physical fights in full view of their children, not knowing that they are hurting these young souls and affecting their overall health and development.
Research has established that children who suffer from depression during their formative years tend to develop abnormally.
A study carried out by the Washington University School of Medicine in 2016 showed that in such children, the tissue that connects brain cells and carries signals between those cells and is involved in seeing, hearing, memory, decision-making and emotion is lower in volume and thinner in the cortex, which is the part of the brain that is responsible for the processing of emotions.
People often tend to think that children are too young to understand what is going on around them. There are parents who have disagreements and trade insults as their children look on and listen.
At times, parents are even involved in physical fights in full view of their children, not knowing that they are hurting these young souls and affecting their overall health and development.
While there are several causes of depression in children, three factors that stand out are genetic vulnerability, exposure to stress and suboptimal early developmental experiences. Unfortunately, children have no control of these situations, and it is upon the adults to come up with quick interventions and try not to expose children to stressful environments.
Whenever a child is depressed, others many think that is just an ordinary phase they are passing through, but this is not the case.
Parents should watch out for vital signs, which include lack of concentration, loss of appetite, severe sensitivity to rejection, changes in playing habits and changes in sleep patterns.
It is time more attention was paid to a child’s mental health. Never ignore his or her emotional concerns under any circumstances.
In Tanzania there is still a need for more research on intervention with regard to depression in children, which affects their health and development.
WHY MIND-SET CHANGE IS KEY
Job creation and unemployment are sensitive issues globally. Various reports show that the situation is worse in Tanzania, where the rate of unemployment is in the double digits.
In the meantime, employers complain about personnel devoid of skills. They argue that they have to invest substantial sums in shaping up and bringing their employees to the desired standards.
What, then, is the cause of this mismatch? That our education system has problems is a foregone conclusion. It provides the labour market with semi-skilled and barely-skilled personnel. What is even worse is that it tunes the minds of students to think of “getting an employment somewhere” rather than self-employment.
This calls for serious reforms. To start with, all those with doctorates should, by law, transform themselves into institutions capable of creating jobs. This would not only help create more decent jobs but would also encourage innovation. Production too would rise.
The role of the government is to provide an enabling environment for this transformation to take place. It must ensure that the education system is aligned with modern needs.
Families should fine-tune children’s thinking so they appreciate self-employment from a young age.
