.Behavior problems seen in kids of U.S. combat troops
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have been hard not only on U.S. troops sent to fight them but on the young children they have left behind, U.S. researchers said on Monday.
Children aged 3 to 5 with a parent deployed to one of the two war zones exhibit more behavioral problems such as aggressiveness than similar children in military families without a parent deployed, according to the study.
More than 2 million U.S. children have had parents deployed to fight in Iraq since 2003 or in Afghanistan since 2001.
"The whole family dynamic changes when one parent is away for a long period," said Dr. Deborah Frank, one of the researchers.
"And in this case, on top of the usual stresses of separation, even very young children can sense the anxiety that not only is the parent not there but something terrible might happen to them," Frank said in a telephone interview.
The study by a team from Boston Medical Center and Boston University tracked 169 families with preschool-age children enrolled in military child care facilities in 2007 at a large Marine Corps base, which the researchers declined to identify.
A third of the children in the study had a parent currently deployed, 90 percent of the time the father.
Both parents and child care providers assessed behavior, the researchers wrote in Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine.
Parents who remained behind typically were white mothers with some college education married to enlisted Marines.
Compared to children with no parent deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, those with a deployed parent more often had problems with aggressive behavior, inattentiveness and impulsiveness, the researchers said.
The study also looked at children ages 18 months to 3 years and found fewer such problems in these toddlers.
"We have to realize that it's not just the people on the field of battle who are suffering from these wars but their families and their young children," Frank said.
The United States currently has 152,000 troops in Iraq and 31,000 in Afghanistan. Army soldiers are deployed for at least a year at a time and Marines for seven months at a time. Many have been deployed repeatedly.
"It's the multiple deployments that are really starting to get to kids," said Joyce Raezer, executive director of the National Military Family Association, which provides resources and support to spouses and children of military personnel.
"Maybe a family makes it through the first deployment fairly well, but they don't fully recover from the first deployment before that service member is into the second or third or whatever deployment. How do you measure that cumulative effect?" Raezer said in a telephone interview.
Reuters
Children aged 3 to 5 with a parent deployed to one of the two war zones exhibit more behavioral problems such as aggressiveness than similar children in military families without a parent deployed, according to the study.
More than 2 million U.S. children have had parents deployed to fight in Iraq since 2003 or in Afghanistan since 2001.
"The whole family dynamic changes when one parent is away for a long period," said Dr. Deborah Frank, one of the researchers.
"And in this case, on top of the usual stresses of separation, even very young children can sense the anxiety that not only is the parent not there but something terrible might happen to them," Frank said in a telephone interview.
The study by a team from Boston Medical Center and Boston University tracked 169 families with preschool-age children enrolled in military child care facilities in 2007 at a large Marine Corps base, which the researchers declined to identify.
A third of the children in the study had a parent currently deployed, 90 percent of the time the father.
Both parents and child care providers assessed behavior, the researchers wrote in Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine.
Parents who remained behind typically were white mothers with some college education married to enlisted Marines.
Compared to children with no parent deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, those with a deployed parent more often had problems with aggressive behavior, inattentiveness and impulsiveness, the researchers said.
The study also looked at children ages 18 months to 3 years and found fewer such problems in these toddlers.
"We have to realize that it's not just the people on the field of battle who are suffering from these wars but their families and their young children," Frank said.
The United States currently has 152,000 troops in Iraq and 31,000 in Afghanistan. Army soldiers are deployed for at least a year at a time and Marines for seven months at a time. Many have been deployed repeatedly.
"It's the multiple deployments that are really starting to get to kids," said Joyce Raezer, executive director of the National Military Family Association, which provides resources and support to spouses and children of military personnel.
"Maybe a family makes it through the first deployment fairly well, but they don't fully recover from the first deployment before that service member is into the second or third or whatever deployment. How do you measure that cumulative effect?" Raezer said in a telephone interview.
Reuters
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