Young Refugees Research Articles

Coping mechanisms and “homemaking” in the face of environmental challenges: exploring the experiences of adolescent refugees in Jordan

ABSTRACT “: Home” is both a physical location and a space of important emotional and social attachments. Often associated with safety and familiarity, homes are also places where power inequalities may be reinforced. Contrary to human rights treaties stipulating the right of refugees to live in shelters that meet their basic needs, adolescent refugees in Jordan often reside in poor-quality housing within built environments that do not foster their wellbeing. Yet despite a burgeoning literature on refugee “homemaking”, little is known about how young refugees in Jordan perceive and respond to challenges in the built environment. This article addresses this knowledge gap, focusing on how gender norms are configured within “homemaking” practices. It draws on qualitative interviews with 31 adolescents in diverse locations: Syrians living in a formal refugee camp (Azraq), host communities, and informal tented settlements, and Palestinians without citizenship living in Jerash camp. Our findings show that refugee adolescents in Jordan face intersecting challenges, including poor access to services, inadequate housing infrastructure and sanitation, and safety concerns. These challenges vary based on location and are shaped by gender norms that influence access to spaces both inside and outside the household. Although adaptation methods can make homes more livable in terms of safety, aesthetics and practicality, these adaptations often reinforce gender norms that restrict girls’ mobility. This article concludes by underscoring that although refugees can make small changes to address immediate needs, structural responses which address gender inequalities and improve social protection support are essential to improving young refugees’ lives.

Enhancing benefits for peer researchers: towards a flexible and needs-based approach to participatory research

ABSTRACT The involvement of peer researchers has recently gained popularity in social research, and the incentives for using participatory methodologies are well recognised. However, as we argue, the sole presence of peer researchers does not equate to their immediate empowerment, and more attention should be given to the roles they play in the research and the ways in which they can tangibly benefit from such collaborations. We explore the seemingly mundane aspects of work such as recruitment, training, conducting research, dissemination and the afterlife of the project, to suggest that meaningful engagement of peer researchers demands a tailored approach that is receptive to their particular needs and motivations, and is supportive of their individual growth. Our critical reflection stems from a two-year-long collaboration with peer researchers in Poland undertaken as part of a Horizon 2020 project, which explored the lives of young migrants and refugees in Europe.

Fleeing Nazi Persecution: Jewish Refugee Child Diarists as Family Chroniclers

This article examines the diaries of young Jewish refugees who documented their emigration from Germany and Austria in the 1930s and who wrote for family members, imagining future readers of their accounts. These diaries offer unique access to children's voices during the Holocaust, showing how some child refugees became family chroniclers, self-consciously documenting a story of Jewish resistance and survival, as well as a tragedy of loss. Their diaries became treasured material objects and autobiographical texts that perform a writing subject, a child as author and narrator, asserting agency in a situation in which they were multiply marginalised as children and as Jewish refugees.

Who is a minor? Age assessments of refugees in Germany and the classificatory multiplicity of the state

The categories that states use to classify and govern migrants often diverge from how migrants themselves perceive and experience their conditions, biographies, and identities. Building on this insight, I argue in this article that state categories not only clash with migrants’ varied notions of categories: state categorization itself often relies on multiple definitions of categories and methods of categorization. Age assessments of young refugees in Germany demonstrate this multiplicity. These assessments are carried out by forensic medical examiners and social workers, respectively, who work with very different understandings of what constitutes age. While forensic scientists view age as countable, particular, and objective, social workers think of it as lived, assembled, and constructed. What I term the classificatory multiplicity of the state complements current scholarly endeavors aimed at critically examining state categories, particularly in the context of migration governance.

An imperial meantime

AbstractOn November 13, 2020, the Sahrawi movement for national liberation, known as the Polisario Front, resumed its armed struggle against Morocco's occupation of Western Sahara. With this decision, the movement put an end to a 29‐year‐long peace process throughout which the implementation of international law had been indefinitely deferred. During this cease‐fire, the Polisario used humanitarian aid to strengthen its nation‐state building in exile. This practice formed part of a larger historical narration that was inserted into the cease‐fire's temporal parenthesis, or what I call an imperial meantime. As a result, a disjuncture arose between the movement's political forms and its goal of achieving state sovereignty over Western Sahara. During this imperial meantime, a generation of refugees came of age. Describing the contradictions experienced by young politicized refugees, and highlighting the role that the control over time plays in humanitarian governance, I show how the invisible violence of a humanitarian peace anticipated the return to armed struggle.

Making Friends as Interactional Work: Young Refugees in Germany

This article focuses on the friendships that young refugees make in Germany as their country of arrival. Although friends are highly relevant in children's lives, little attention has been paid to this subject regarding young refugees. We conducted ego‐network interviews with 17 young refugees aged 9–15, with which we explored the opportunity structures in which young refugees choose their friends and their ways of establishing and deepening friendships, as well as the limitations thereof. Core dimensions of friendship, as proposed by Shmuel Eisenstadt, are used as sensitizing concepts: voluntariness, moral quality, unconditionality, trust, deep meaning/brittleness, and ambivalence. By reinterpreting them through an interactionist lens, the analysis reveals the complex work young refugees invest into making friends and establishing themselves in the social world of their school and peer groups.

A psychosocial bouldering intervention improves the well-being of young refugees and adolescents from the host community in Lebanon: results from a pragmatic controlled trial

BackgroundMental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) is increasingly considered vital for addressing the needs of displaced communities. The mental health of young people in Lebanon, including members of the host community and refugees, has been severely affected by multiple crises. Physical activity (PA) is an effective means for enhancing mental health, but evidence of PA’s impact on mental health among forcibly displaced populations is still emerging and often varies widely across studies.MethodIn this waitlist-controlled study, we examined the effectiveness of an 8-week psychosocial bouldering group intervention offered by the nonprofit organization ClimbAID on psychological well-being, distress, self-efficacy, and social cohesion in a group of mostly Syrian refugee adolescents residing in the Bekaa Valley, Lebanon. The intervention consisted of 8 sessions and took place once a week for 2 h in a group of up to 12 adolescents with 2 trained facilitators and up to 2 volunteers, supervised by a climbing instructor and a social worker. Multilevel analyses were performed for all outcomes.Results233 people were included in the study. The dropout rate was approximately 33%. The IG improved significantly more than the waitlist group in terms of overall mental well-being and psychological distress. Group allocation was a significant predictor of improvements in mental well-being and psychological distress and showed a trend toward predicting self-efficacy. There was no positive impact of the intervention on social cohesion.ConclusionsEven in complex humanitarian settings of forced displacement, a psychosocial bouldering intervention reduces psychological distress and increases well-being in a mixed group of host and refugee youth in Bekaa, Lebanon.Trial registrationProspectively registered with ISRCTN 13005983, registered April 1st, 2022.

Management and outcome of cutaneous diphtheria in adolescent refugees in Germany, June 2022 - October 2023.

From September 2022 an increase in Corynebacterium diphtheriae (C. diphtheriae)infections was reported in Europe. Our study focuses on 31 adolescent and young adult refugees with cutaneous C. diphtheriae infections detected in Germany. We examined treatment regimens and outcomes to provide targeted insights into the management of this infection. We distributed a standardized survey, focused on children and adolescents presenting to paediatric clinics through the German Paediatric Infectious Diseases Society (DGPI) and additional professional contacts in Germany. Data were extracted from routine medical documentation and reported anonymously. A total of 31 individuals with cutaneous C. diphtheriae infection were reported by 9 centres. Two of these showed diphtheria toxin (DT) related systemic symptoms and four exhibited systemic inflammation requiring complex management. The remaining 25 cases, with exclusively cutaneous manifestations, were afebrile. Treatment with topical antiseptics and systemic antibiotics, mainly aminopenicillin/beta-lactamase inhibitors (BLI) (35%) or clindamycin (25%), achieved eradication in all but two cases treated with aminopenicillin/BLI. Treatment duration varied between 5 and 17 days. In refugees presenting with chronic skin wounds, C. diphtheriae should be included into the differential diagnosis. Fever seems to be a valuable marker to differentiate severe cases with potentially DT-mediated sequelae from exclusively cutaneous diphtheria (CD). For afebrile CD, topical antiseptics and oral antibiotic therapy with clindamycin for 7 days, followed by clinical surveillance appears to be a safe treatment regimen. Patients with CD who present with fever or pharyngitis should be thoroughly investigated including blood and pharyngeal swab cultures.

Rites without Passage: The Civic Conversion of Young Refugees in Contemporary Germany

Rites without Passage: The Civic Conversion of Young Refugees in Contemporary Germany

Stress and Trauma Symptoms in Young Palestine Refugee Children Following the May 2021 Escalation in Gaza

Stress and Trauma Symptoms in Young Palestine Refugee Children Following the May 2021 Escalation in Gaza

Trajectories of mental health problems in unaccompanied young refugees in Germany and the impact of post-migration factors - a longitudinal study.

Unaccompanied young refugees (UYRs) are at an elevated risk of continuing psychological distress, including posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS), depression, and anxiety. The post-arrival situation in a host country plays an important role in increasing or reducing mental health risks for UYRs. This study aimed to examine the trajectory of psychological distress and post-migration factors experienced by UYRs in Germany with five assessments every six months over a two-year period.Standardised self-report questionnaires were used to assess PTSS (CATS-2), depression (PHQ-9), and anxiety (GAD-7) symptoms. Material and social stressors (DSSYR), sociocultural adjustment (BSAS), frequency of contact with family members, and distress regarding asylum status were included as post-migration factors. N = 131 UYRs (Mage = 17.04; SDage = 1.46; 81.1% male) living in residential care facilities in Germany were included in this study. There was a significant loss to follow up with n = 77 after 12 months at T2 (59% attrition), and n = 37 after 24 months at T4 (28% attrition).At baseline, clinically relevant symptom scores were found in 48.1% for PTSS, 42.0% for depression, and 22.9% for anxiety. Analysis of latent growth curve models revealed that the symptom severity of depression and anxiety did not change substantially over one year, but PTSS showed a significant decline. The number of traumatic events affected initial levels of mental health problems but not their trajectory over time. The impact of post-migration factors varied between measurement points and outcome measures and did not result in a homogeneous pattern.Despite limitations, this study demonstrated the persistence of high levels of psychological distress in UYRs. Effective interventions are required at an early stage to prevent chronic trajectories and support systems should adapt to constantly changing circumstances.Trial registration number/date of registration: DRKS00017453/11th December 2019.

From the Translocal to the Multi‐Sited Transnational: Tracing Rohingya Refugee Networks in India

ABSTRACTThis paper examines the transnational and translocal experiences of the Rohingya in India, a stateless, refugee community forcibly displaced from Myanmar, onward migrants from Bangladesh, who currently occupy a legally precarious space in India. Drawing on approximately 90 interviews conducted with refugees, community leaders and NGOs across three Indian cities, along with informal group discussions and field notes, this paper makes two arguments that shed light on the complex, multi‐factorial ways in which networks are rebuilt in displacement as well as the emerging characteristics of Rohingya onward migration in Asia. First, that early generations of Rohingya in India leveraged translocal network building spaces and encounters to rebuild their networks with others in the community and create translocal networks of care and support with local civil society actors, cementing the notion of a ‘Rohingya refugee community’ in India. Second, that the gradual internationalisation of the Rohingya crisis as well as the transnationalisation of the Rohingya diaspora in the last decade through multiple waves of displacement, onward migration and resettlement schemes has prompted a shift towards multi‐sited transnationalism, particularly reflected in the emergence of multi‐sited transnational families, digital transnational spaces among younger refugees and extended diasporic networks.

Psycho-social Stressors Experienced by Young war Refugees in Developed Countries: A Scoping Review.

Refugees escaping political unrest and war are an especially vulnerable group. Arrival in high-income countries (HICs) is associated with a 'new type of war', as war refugees experience elevated rates of psycho-social and daily stressors. The purpose of this scoping review is to examine literature on psycho-social stressors amongst young war refugees in HICs and impact of stressors on intergenerational transmission of trauma within parent-child dyads. The secondary objectives are to identify the pre-migration versus post-migration stressors and provide a basis to inform future research projects that aim to lessen the burden of stress and inform evidence-based improvements in this population. Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses Scoping Review Extension (PRISMA-ScR) guided the reporting of this review that was performed using a prescribed scoping review method. Extracted from five databases, 23 manuscripts published in 2010 or later met the inclusion criteria. Three themes emerged: pre-migration stressors, migration journey stressors and uncertainty, and post-migration stressors. While post-migration environments can mitigate the health and well-being of war refugees, socio-cultural barriers that refugees often experience at the host country prevent or worsen their psycho-social recovery. To assist the success of war refugees in HICs, therapeutic interventions must follow an intersectional approach and there needs to be a wider application of trauma informed models of care. Findings of this review may help inform future intervention studies aiming to improve the psycho-social health of this population.

Religion as a Resource? The Impact of Religiosity on the Sense of Purpose in Life of Young Muslim Refugees in Germany

This study examines the relationship between religiosity and purpose in life among young Muslim refugees (n = 222; Mage = 20.18 years) in Germany, a topic little explored to date. Consistent with previous research, respondents felt a moderate but positive sense of purpose in life, which was fostered by religiosity. Regression analysis demonstrated that even after controlling for physical health and social support, religiosity remained a substantial predictor of purpose in life; its effect size did not differ significantly from the other two variables in the model. The findings emphasize the importance of religiosity and social support for young Muslim refugees’ well-being.

Stronger after the war? Resilience and posttraumatic growth among Ukrainian young refugees: the mediating role of hope

ABSTRACT The present study aimed to examine the relation between resilience and posttraumatic growth among young Ukrainian refugees. The sample comprised 102 Ukrainian students who fled the war in their country and found shelter in Romania. They were enrolled in Romanian universities. They filled out self-reported scales measuring resilience, posttraumatic growth, and hope two years after the military conflict between Russia and Ukraine started. Results indicated positive associations between resilience, posttraumatic growth, and hope. The link between resilience and posttraumatic growth was fully mediated by hope. We discuss these findings considering their practical implications for fostering the well-being of vulnerable youth, such as Ukrainian refugees.

Refugees’ Storytelling Strategies on Digital Media Platforms: How the Russia–Ukraine War Unfolded on TikTok

The article discusses how TikTok has emerged as a platform for self-representation and political contestation during the Russia–Ukraine war. Shortly after the beginning of the conflict, journalists and broadcasters have begun to associate the events unfolding in those countries with the widespread use of this platform among young content creators, refugees, soldiers, and civilians. Described as the “first TikTok war” or as “WarTok,” the conflict in Ukraine represents an important example to look at to uncover the increasingly central role of platforms as spaces where conflicts can be witnessed, documented, and shared with global audiences in real time. The research findings illustrate how TikTok becomes a space where material and affective practices of “performed refugeeness” can become visible and viral due to its unique language, formatting style, and highly personalized narratives, while creating a transnational streaming of war-related discourses that not only bypass traditional circuits of news sharing, but also activate a digital care network that crosses borders and connects diverse digital publics. While the study is small scale to account for a more in-depth narrative analysis of TikTok videos, it nevertheless returns significant insights into refugees’ digital storytelling strategies in conflict areas.

Access to Labour and “Differential Inclusion” for Young Venezuelan Migrants in Ecuador

Young migrants and refugees provide important inputs concerning production and social reproduction mechanisms (care work) that reproduce unequal but highly profitable patterns of accumulation around the world. The expansion of globalisation and neoliberalism has deepened such social dynamics, leading to a “multiplication of labour.” The diversification and heterogenization of migrant labour within neoliberal frameworks raise ethical and human rights concerns, including issues related to fair wages, working conditions, and access to social protections. After a neoliberal era in Latin America, the emergence of post‐development politics in the region led to increased efforts to address the needs of these populations. This article seeks to contribute to debates about “differential inclusion” in South–South migration and access to labour and social protection by analysing a specific case study of young Venezuelans, a recently growing phenomenon that has a great impact on the region. Ecuador is noteworthy because it hosts one of the largest populations of Venezuelan migrants and refugees and has adopted a human rights perspective in conjunction with public investments in social policy, health, and education. Despite efforts to legalize the work status of Venezuelan migrants, a more restrictive policy began to be implemented in 2019 that limited their access to formal labour and social protection. Within these complex dynamics of differential inclusion, instead of seeing these young migrants and refugees as victims, we analyse their resilience strategies of accessing social provisions while coping with informality and irregular status, as well as conditions of multiplication of labour. Using four real‐life stories as examples taken from a larger ethnographic study, we illustrate how dynamics of differential inclusion intersect with the gender, age, and legal status of young Venezuelans in Ecuador. The case studies are complemented with structural explanations from 6,000 household surveys collected between 2017 and 2020.

Conceptualising the art of belonging for young refugees and asylum-seekers: reflections from England and Sweden

ABSTRACT The concept of belonging has grown in prominence in research and policy relating to new arrivals from refugee and asylum-seeking backgrounds. Arguably, belonging is replacing integration and inclusion as the panacea to perceived problems associated with places and societies where new arrivals settle. Belonging is also prominent in the literature about formal and informal educational contexts. This paper problematises the concept of belonging. It draws on findings from a research project which explored how young, forced migrants, newly arrived in Europe, could be supported through engagement with arts and culture to achieve a sense of belonging in their new place. Interview data and observational fieldnotes illustrate how belonging and unbelonging are experienced through an informal education programme of arts and culture in two cities in Sweden and England. The paper sheds light on the complexity and ambiguity of belonging for the participants, arguing that ‘to belong’ is not an unequivocally positive experience for new arrivals. In an era of increasing migration, the paper calls for a new language for belonging which recognises this complexity and acknowledges that the process of belonging is reciprocal involving those who have newly arrived and those in situ in the communities in which newcomers settle.

Marital quality in a context of displacement: the role of union formation characteristics among Syrian refugee and Jordanian youth

Marital quality is an important determinant of well-being and is related to how unions are formed. Both processes of union formation and marital relationships may be influenced by stressful conditions, including insecurity and displacement. We leverage unique representative data on young Syrian refugees in Jordan to learn more about the interplay between displacement, union formation characteristics and marital quality. Through comparisons with youth from the Jordanian host population, we assess the role of key contextual predictors of marital quality, such as consanguinity and young people’s role in choosing their spouse, with a focus on gender differences. We measure marital quality with six separate items capturing aspects of equality, respect and interpersonal communication and a unidimensional scale identified through exploratory factor analysis. Results show that consanguinity, marital duration and number of children are generally unrelated to marital quality in both populations. In contrast, involvement in spouse choice emerges as the strongest predictor, with both Syrians and Jordanians in family-arranged unions experiencing lower-quality marriages. Among Syrians, women suffer more from lower marital quality, especially when arranged unions happen at a young age, and marriages formed after displacement to Jordan appear more fragile. The study is one of the first to explore predictors of marital quality in a non-Western, conflict-affected population. The findings emphasise the importance of the demographic study of family dynamics in situations of insecurity and displacement moving beyond a narrow focus on marriage timing to cover a wider range of marriage outcomes related to family well-being.

The education of Polish children deported to the USSR and evacuated to the near and Middle East during World War II

The text describes fragmentary education gained by children deported from the territory of Poland occupied by the Soviet Union to the forced labour camps and kolkhozes. They were subsequently evacuated from the USSR to Iran and other countries controlled by Great Britain. The release of such a large group of people from Gulag camps and places of isolation was an unprecedented situation in the Soviet system, and the presence of such a large number of civilians along the regular military units being formed at the time was unexampled in history. The authors illustrate education methods and conditions of Polish youth released with their families from Gulag camps and locations of compulsory labour together under the so-called amnesty. They provide details regarding the young refugees’ health issues, numerous cases of starvation to death or symptoms of post-traumatic stress (PTSD ‒ post-traumatic stress disorder). They present the problems with the evacuation itself and confront the standards of living and expulsion from Soviet Russia with a highly positive reception of refugees on the Persian land. They indicate their further fate, including the creation of orphanages and schools, as children in the USSR were deprived of the opportunity to learn. It was important to depict extremely difficult, frequently provisional attempts at schooling Polish youngsters against the background of historic events.