Wendy Haight - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Wendy Haight

Oxford University Press eBooks, Dec 19, 2019

Chapter 9 summarizes findings from a decade-long program of cross-cultural research on disability... more Chapter 9 summarizes findings from a decade-long program of cross-cultural research on disability, stigmatization, and children’s developing cultural selves in Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and the U.S. It articulates implications for a developmental cultural model of disability, methodological approaches, practice, policy, and future research. It also discusses challenges of cross-cultural research including working within international research teams.

Oxford University Press eBooks, Dec 19, 2019

Chapter 4 considers how educators’ perspectives and practices may be affected by the broad develo... more Chapter 4 considers how educators’ perspectives and practices may be affected by the broad developmental changes experienced by the children they educate. Over the past few years, there has been an increasing interest in the importance of understanding the experiences of children with disabilities. This chapter summarizes available literature, conducted almost exclusively in Western cultural contexts, on the experiences of children with disabilities and their typically developing siblings and peers focusing on disability, stigmatization, and the cultural self. Then it considers related socialization practices by adults in East Asian countries and the U.S.

Social Work, Jul 23, 2022

This ethnographic study explores how Japanese immigrant and temporary resident parents support th... more This ethnographic study explores how Japanese immigrant and temporary resident parents support their children’s acculturation to U.S. society. Anti-Asian hatred is a neglected social justice issue with a long history extending to hate crimes during the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet the U.S. population includes an increasing number of Asian immigrants. Some of them, such as recent Japanese immigrants and temporary residents, are from majority groups in their countries of origin, and do not have cultural socialization practices to protect their children from racism and xenophobia. This article focuses on in-depth, individual interviews with 14 Japanese immigrant and temporary resident parents of children attending U.S. local schools. Parents described their cultural socialization as centering on developing a Japanese cultural self, for example, through participation in a Japanese supplementary school. Parents also reported experiences of anti-Asian racism and xenophobia, including social exclusion. However, they typically did not describe preparing children directly for responding to and coping with anti-Asian bias. Rather, they and their children took responsibility for bias directed against them, and avoided drawing attention to their differences. Authors discuss implications for how social workers can recognize distress in Japanese children and effectively support them and others experiencing similar acculturation challenges.

Disability, Stigma, and Children's Developing Selves

In responding to the impact of stigmatization on children with disabilities, educators from Japan... more In responding to the impact of stigmatization on children with disabilities, educators from Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and the U.S. typically considered children’s individual self, for example, their academic progress, as well as socialization practices to help them function better in their classrooms (socially embedded self). Their responses, however, were culturally nuanced. Educators in Japan described supporting children’s sense of belonging to their classroom peer groups, while educators in South Korea described helping children become contributing members of mutually supportive classroom peer groups. Educators in Taiwan helped children to regulate their intense emotions resulting from frustration and failure to meet expectations, and educators in the U.S. worked to support children’s self-esteem. Chapter 7 also presents educators’ similar and culturally nuanced discussions of socialization practices to reduce the effect of peers’ disability and stigmatization on typically dev...

Children and Youth Services Review, 2016

The stigmatization of individuals with disabilities is a widespread social justice issue. This pa... more The stigmatization of individuals with disabilities is a widespread social justice issue. This paper introduces a study of disability, stigmatization and self for children with disabilities and their typically-developing peers. It is the first of two companion papers. It examines the problem of stigmatization from the perspectives of experienced elementary school educators practicing in diverse cultural contexts. We conducted cross-cultural analyses of individual, audio recorded interviews with 26 Japanese, 43 Korean, 16 Taiwanese and 18 US educators, including school social workers. Educators from all four cultural groups described disability and stigma as challenging children's development of self: children with disabilities may experience the self as isolated and inadequate, and typically-developing peers may experience the self as lacking culturally expected values of empathy and respect. Educators' understandings of children's experiences also were culturally nuanced. Educators variously described children with disabilities as experiencing a sense of not belonging [Japan], loss of motivation [South Korea], too much shame [Taiwan], and low self-esteem [US]. They variously described typicallydeveloping children as challenged to show empathy [Japan], include children with disabilities in their peer group [South Korea], develop benevolence [Taiwan], and show respect for individual differences [US]. We contextualize educators' perceptions within their specific socioculturalhistorical contexts. Our second paper will focus on solutions; specifically, educators' perspectives on how to minimize stigmatization and support the development of self for children with disabilities and their typically-developing peers. Together, these companion papers provide social workers with valuable perspectives for eliminating the stigmatization of children with disabilities in future generations.

Disability, Culture, and Development, 2013

Disability, Stigma, and Children's Developing Selves

Interlude 2 briefly illustrates the perspectives of Japanese and South Korean parents who have ch... more Interlude 2 briefly illustrates the perspectives of Japanese and South Korean parents who have children with disabilities. It also describes strategies used for approaching parents on this highly sensitive topic. Japanese parents discussed their children’s challenges, the benefits they perceived of disability services, and their preferences for how their children should be supported at school. South Korean parents described their children’s challenges including stigmatization, the impact on typically developing siblings, and the importance of the support they received from other parents raising children with disabilities. Understanding parents’ perspectives on their children’s disabilities and associated stigmatization can facilitate collaborative parent–educator relationships necessary to supporting the school functioning of children with disabilities.

PubMed, Aug 25, 2005

Mothers of young children recently placed in foster care participated in an intervention to enhan... more Mothers of young children recently placed in foster care participated in an intervention to enhance parent-child interaction during visits. The mothers all reported substantial loss and trauma histories. Immediately prior to the visits, the mothers were coached on strategies for separating from their children at the visit's end. The mothers displayed more behavioral strategies for supporting their children when the visit was over, but were less engaged with their children during the leave-taking sequence and displayed fewer ways of maintaining the child's involvement in mother-child interaction during leave-taking than those in a comparison group. This article discusses consideration of parents' trauma history in designing interventions to enhance parent-child interaction.

Children and Youth Services Review, Mar 1, 2020

The experience of moral injury is of increased concern to child welfare professionals. This ethno... more The experience of moral injury is of increased concern to child welfare professionals. This ethnographic study uses Akan (Ghanaian) women who are widowed and their children as an exemplary case study to consider the cultural shaping of moral injury, and implications for culturally-sensitive child welfare practice. We conducted in-depth, semi-structured, audio-recorded interviews. Twenty-one widows, 14 religious professionals providing services to widows, and one secular professional participated. Participants identified some morally injurious events and responses consistent with the Western literature, for example, events involving betrayal of widows and their children were associated with feelings of intense sadness, rage, and spiritual or existential crises. Other events and responses were culturally nuanced. Women's vulnerability to morally injurious events was enhanced due to culturally-based gender roles, widowhood rituals and customary laws involving inheritance. In addition, these events were interpreted and experienced through Akan spirituality in which the self is comprised of the soul, spirit and body; and moral injury, or "soul killing," involves the dissolution of this trinity and embitterment of the soul. The Akan cultural context also provided resources for healing. Akan women who were widowed articulated the empowerment and restoration they felt from coming together in a community both to address a common challenge (supporting themselves and their children financially), and to receive spiritual and psychosocial support from peers and professionals. This paper provides both a conceptual framework for the empirical examination of the cultural shaping of moral injury, and empirical data within a non-Western cultural context.

International Social Work, Sep 13, 2017

Social workers are increasingly embracing international perspectives and roles to address persist... more Social workers are increasingly embracing international perspectives and roles to address persistent human rights issues. This study examines solutions to property rights disputes involving Ghanaian women who are widowed from the perspectives of Akan men and women in four communities. Property ownership is fundamental to the economic survival of women and their children, but millions of women around the world lose their rights to property following the deaths of their husbands. We conducted focus groups with 102 participants in four Akan communities to generate local, culturally viable solutions for preventing property rights violations and resolving them when they do occur.

Qualitative Social Work

This scoping review describes the available research on the experiences of Somali immigrant paren... more This scoping review describes the available research on the experiences of Somali immigrant parents acculturating within Western countries including the U.S., Canada, South Africa, England, and Scandinavia. A total of 19 studies were identified that focused on Somali immigrant families, discussed parenting, and were written in English. Ten were published in peer-reviewed journals including in social work, mental health, and nursing. The other studies were reported in a book chapter and eight graduate-level theses. The studies were qualitative, and identified several themes related to parental strengths and stressors as they acculturated to Western countries. Stressors included conflicts between Western and Islamic values within racist contexts, shifting from communal to nuclear family parenting, and changes in family dynamics. Strengths included strong ties to spirituality, a deep commitment to family, and a strong love of and pride in their cultural identity. Implications for pract...

Qualitative Social Work, Jul 13, 2022

Children and Youth Services Review, 2017

This study considers any "moral injury" occurring among parents involved with the Child Protectio... more This study considers any "moral injury" occurring among parents involved with the Child Protection System (CPS). Moral injury refers to the lasting psychological, spiritual and social harm caused by one's own or another's actions in a high stakes situation that transgress deeply held moral beliefs and expectations. The existing literature focuses on military contexts, but moral injury also may play a role in increasing the vulnerability of CPS clients who are threatened with loss of their parental rights and dissolution of their families. We administered a modified version of the Moral Injury Events Scale (MIES) (Nash et al., 2013) to 10 CPS involved parents. We then conducted in-depth, semi-structured, audio recorded individual interviews with parents to elaborate their responses to the MIES. Parents' MIES scores and interview elaborations suggest that some CPS-involved parents do experience moral injury. Moral injury was reported as a result of their own parenting behaviors, but also as a result of parents' involvement with professionals and within social systems that are charged with providing assistance to struggling families. For instance, some parents perceived professionals to be shaming, social services to be harmful and legal proceedings stigmatizing. Parents' reported reactions to morally injurious events included lasting feelings of guilt, shame and anger; and loss of trust in professionals. These responses impeded their perceived abilities to fully engage in services. If involvement in CPS places parents at increased risk of moral injury, then moral injury is a critically important construct for child welfare policy makers and workers to understand and address in the conduct of effective, ethical child welfare practice.

Encyclopedia of Social Work, 2016

Racial disproportionality in out-of-school suspensions (suspensions) is a persistent, multi-level... more Racial disproportionality in out-of-school suspensions (suspensions) is a persistent, multi-level social justice and child well-being issue affecting not only youth, families, and schools but society as a whole. It is a complex, multiple-level social problem that will require an equally complex response. The design of effective remedies will require adequate understanding of the problem as well as the historical and sociocultural contexts in which it emerged and is perpetuated. Progressive educators have offered a number of alternatives to harsh and exclusionary discipline, but research is needed to examine their effectiveness, especially in reducing racial disproportionalities.

PubMed, May 17, 2002

Mothers of children recently placed in foster care, foster mothers, and child welfare workers par... more Mothers of children recently placed in foster care, foster mothers, and child welfare workers participated in semistructured, clinical interviews focusing on the challenges of parent visitation with young children. Mothers described their feelings of grief, trauma, and rage about the forced separation from their children and stressed the importance of emotional expression and communication during visits. Child welfare workers described the complexities of supporting emotionally close parent-child interactions while monitoring and assessing parental behavior during visits. Foster mothers described the importance of preparing children for visits and the difficulties of supporting the children afterward. Implications of understanding mothers', foster mothers', and child welfare workers' perspectives on enhancing the quality of visits with young children are discussed.

Children and Youth Services Review

Children and Youth Services Review

Oxford University Press eBooks, Dec 19, 2019

Chapter 9 summarizes findings from a decade-long program of cross-cultural research on disability... more Chapter 9 summarizes findings from a decade-long program of cross-cultural research on disability, stigmatization, and children’s developing cultural selves in Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and the U.S. It articulates implications for a developmental cultural model of disability, methodological approaches, practice, policy, and future research. It also discusses challenges of cross-cultural research including working within international research teams.

Oxford University Press eBooks, Dec 19, 2019

Chapter 4 considers how educators’ perspectives and practices may be affected by the broad develo... more Chapter 4 considers how educators’ perspectives and practices may be affected by the broad developmental changes experienced by the children they educate. Over the past few years, there has been an increasing interest in the importance of understanding the experiences of children with disabilities. This chapter summarizes available literature, conducted almost exclusively in Western cultural contexts, on the experiences of children with disabilities and their typically developing siblings and peers focusing on disability, stigmatization, and the cultural self. Then it considers related socialization practices by adults in East Asian countries and the U.S.

Social Work, Jul 23, 2022

This ethnographic study explores how Japanese immigrant and temporary resident parents support th... more This ethnographic study explores how Japanese immigrant and temporary resident parents support their children’s acculturation to U.S. society. Anti-Asian hatred is a neglected social justice issue with a long history extending to hate crimes during the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet the U.S. population includes an increasing number of Asian immigrants. Some of them, such as recent Japanese immigrants and temporary residents, are from majority groups in their countries of origin, and do not have cultural socialization practices to protect their children from racism and xenophobia. This article focuses on in-depth, individual interviews with 14 Japanese immigrant and temporary resident parents of children attending U.S. local schools. Parents described their cultural socialization as centering on developing a Japanese cultural self, for example, through participation in a Japanese supplementary school. Parents also reported experiences of anti-Asian racism and xenophobia, including social exclusion. However, they typically did not describe preparing children directly for responding to and coping with anti-Asian bias. Rather, they and their children took responsibility for bias directed against them, and avoided drawing attention to their differences. Authors discuss implications for how social workers can recognize distress in Japanese children and effectively support them and others experiencing similar acculturation challenges.

Disability, Stigma, and Children's Developing Selves

In responding to the impact of stigmatization on children with disabilities, educators from Japan... more In responding to the impact of stigmatization on children with disabilities, educators from Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and the U.S. typically considered children’s individual self, for example, their academic progress, as well as socialization practices to help them function better in their classrooms (socially embedded self). Their responses, however, were culturally nuanced. Educators in Japan described supporting children’s sense of belonging to their classroom peer groups, while educators in South Korea described helping children become contributing members of mutually supportive classroom peer groups. Educators in Taiwan helped children to regulate their intense emotions resulting from frustration and failure to meet expectations, and educators in the U.S. worked to support children’s self-esteem. Chapter 7 also presents educators’ similar and culturally nuanced discussions of socialization practices to reduce the effect of peers’ disability and stigmatization on typically dev...

Children and Youth Services Review, 2016

The stigmatization of individuals with disabilities is a widespread social justice issue. This pa... more The stigmatization of individuals with disabilities is a widespread social justice issue. This paper introduces a study of disability, stigmatization and self for children with disabilities and their typically-developing peers. It is the first of two companion papers. It examines the problem of stigmatization from the perspectives of experienced elementary school educators practicing in diverse cultural contexts. We conducted cross-cultural analyses of individual, audio recorded interviews with 26 Japanese, 43 Korean, 16 Taiwanese and 18 US educators, including school social workers. Educators from all four cultural groups described disability and stigma as challenging children's development of self: children with disabilities may experience the self as isolated and inadequate, and typically-developing peers may experience the self as lacking culturally expected values of empathy and respect. Educators' understandings of children's experiences also were culturally nuanced. Educators variously described children with disabilities as experiencing a sense of not belonging [Japan], loss of motivation [South Korea], too much shame [Taiwan], and low self-esteem [US]. They variously described typicallydeveloping children as challenged to show empathy [Japan], include children with disabilities in their peer group [South Korea], develop benevolence [Taiwan], and show respect for individual differences [US]. We contextualize educators' perceptions within their specific socioculturalhistorical contexts. Our second paper will focus on solutions; specifically, educators' perspectives on how to minimize stigmatization and support the development of self for children with disabilities and their typically-developing peers. Together, these companion papers provide social workers with valuable perspectives for eliminating the stigmatization of children with disabilities in future generations.

Disability, Culture, and Development, 2013

Disability, Stigma, and Children's Developing Selves

Interlude 2 briefly illustrates the perspectives of Japanese and South Korean parents who have ch... more Interlude 2 briefly illustrates the perspectives of Japanese and South Korean parents who have children with disabilities. It also describes strategies used for approaching parents on this highly sensitive topic. Japanese parents discussed their children’s challenges, the benefits they perceived of disability services, and their preferences for how their children should be supported at school. South Korean parents described their children’s challenges including stigmatization, the impact on typically developing siblings, and the importance of the support they received from other parents raising children with disabilities. Understanding parents’ perspectives on their children’s disabilities and associated stigmatization can facilitate collaborative parent–educator relationships necessary to supporting the school functioning of children with disabilities.

PubMed, Aug 25, 2005

Mothers of young children recently placed in foster care participated in an intervention to enhan... more Mothers of young children recently placed in foster care participated in an intervention to enhance parent-child interaction during visits. The mothers all reported substantial loss and trauma histories. Immediately prior to the visits, the mothers were coached on strategies for separating from their children at the visit's end. The mothers displayed more behavioral strategies for supporting their children when the visit was over, but were less engaged with their children during the leave-taking sequence and displayed fewer ways of maintaining the child's involvement in mother-child interaction during leave-taking than those in a comparison group. This article discusses consideration of parents' trauma history in designing interventions to enhance parent-child interaction.

Children and Youth Services Review, Mar 1, 2020

The experience of moral injury is of increased concern to child welfare professionals. This ethno... more The experience of moral injury is of increased concern to child welfare professionals. This ethnographic study uses Akan (Ghanaian) women who are widowed and their children as an exemplary case study to consider the cultural shaping of moral injury, and implications for culturally-sensitive child welfare practice. We conducted in-depth, semi-structured, audio-recorded interviews. Twenty-one widows, 14 religious professionals providing services to widows, and one secular professional participated. Participants identified some morally injurious events and responses consistent with the Western literature, for example, events involving betrayal of widows and their children were associated with feelings of intense sadness, rage, and spiritual or existential crises. Other events and responses were culturally nuanced. Women's vulnerability to morally injurious events was enhanced due to culturally-based gender roles, widowhood rituals and customary laws involving inheritance. In addition, these events were interpreted and experienced through Akan spirituality in which the self is comprised of the soul, spirit and body; and moral injury, or "soul killing," involves the dissolution of this trinity and embitterment of the soul. The Akan cultural context also provided resources for healing. Akan women who were widowed articulated the empowerment and restoration they felt from coming together in a community both to address a common challenge (supporting themselves and their children financially), and to receive spiritual and psychosocial support from peers and professionals. This paper provides both a conceptual framework for the empirical examination of the cultural shaping of moral injury, and empirical data within a non-Western cultural context.

International Social Work, Sep 13, 2017

Social workers are increasingly embracing international perspectives and roles to address persist... more Social workers are increasingly embracing international perspectives and roles to address persistent human rights issues. This study examines solutions to property rights disputes involving Ghanaian women who are widowed from the perspectives of Akan men and women in four communities. Property ownership is fundamental to the economic survival of women and their children, but millions of women around the world lose their rights to property following the deaths of their husbands. We conducted focus groups with 102 participants in four Akan communities to generate local, culturally viable solutions for preventing property rights violations and resolving them when they do occur.

Qualitative Social Work

This scoping review describes the available research on the experiences of Somali immigrant paren... more This scoping review describes the available research on the experiences of Somali immigrant parents acculturating within Western countries including the U.S., Canada, South Africa, England, and Scandinavia. A total of 19 studies were identified that focused on Somali immigrant families, discussed parenting, and were written in English. Ten were published in peer-reviewed journals including in social work, mental health, and nursing. The other studies were reported in a book chapter and eight graduate-level theses. The studies were qualitative, and identified several themes related to parental strengths and stressors as they acculturated to Western countries. Stressors included conflicts between Western and Islamic values within racist contexts, shifting from communal to nuclear family parenting, and changes in family dynamics. Strengths included strong ties to spirituality, a deep commitment to family, and a strong love of and pride in their cultural identity. Implications for pract...

Qualitative Social Work, Jul 13, 2022

Children and Youth Services Review, 2017

This study considers any "moral injury" occurring among parents involved with the Child Protectio... more This study considers any "moral injury" occurring among parents involved with the Child Protection System (CPS). Moral injury refers to the lasting psychological, spiritual and social harm caused by one's own or another's actions in a high stakes situation that transgress deeply held moral beliefs and expectations. The existing literature focuses on military contexts, but moral injury also may play a role in increasing the vulnerability of CPS clients who are threatened with loss of their parental rights and dissolution of their families. We administered a modified version of the Moral Injury Events Scale (MIES) (Nash et al., 2013) to 10 CPS involved parents. We then conducted in-depth, semi-structured, audio recorded individual interviews with parents to elaborate their responses to the MIES. Parents' MIES scores and interview elaborations suggest that some CPS-involved parents do experience moral injury. Moral injury was reported as a result of their own parenting behaviors, but also as a result of parents' involvement with professionals and within social systems that are charged with providing assistance to struggling families. For instance, some parents perceived professionals to be shaming, social services to be harmful and legal proceedings stigmatizing. Parents' reported reactions to morally injurious events included lasting feelings of guilt, shame and anger; and loss of trust in professionals. These responses impeded their perceived abilities to fully engage in services. If involvement in CPS places parents at increased risk of moral injury, then moral injury is a critically important construct for child welfare policy makers and workers to understand and address in the conduct of effective, ethical child welfare practice.

Encyclopedia of Social Work, 2016

Racial disproportionality in out-of-school suspensions (suspensions) is a persistent, multi-level... more Racial disproportionality in out-of-school suspensions (suspensions) is a persistent, multi-level social justice and child well-being issue affecting not only youth, families, and schools but society as a whole. It is a complex, multiple-level social problem that will require an equally complex response. The design of effective remedies will require adequate understanding of the problem as well as the historical and sociocultural contexts in which it emerged and is perpetuated. Progressive educators have offered a number of alternatives to harsh and exclusionary discipline, but research is needed to examine their effectiveness, especially in reducing racial disproportionalities.

PubMed, May 17, 2002

Mothers of children recently placed in foster care, foster mothers, and child welfare workers par... more Mothers of children recently placed in foster care, foster mothers, and child welfare workers participated in semistructured, clinical interviews focusing on the challenges of parent visitation with young children. Mothers described their feelings of grief, trauma, and rage about the forced separation from their children and stressed the importance of emotional expression and communication during visits. Child welfare workers described the complexities of supporting emotionally close parent-child interactions while monitoring and assessing parental behavior during visits. Foster mothers described the importance of preparing children for visits and the difficulties of supporting the children afterward. Implications of understanding mothers', foster mothers', and child welfare workers' perspectives on enhancing the quality of visits with young children are discussed.

Children and Youth Services Review

Children and Youth Services Review