School-aged Homeless Sheltered Children's Stressors and Coping Behaviors

The purpose of this study was to examine the stressors and coping behaviors of school-aged homeless children staying in shelters. A secondary analysis of interview data from 30 children, between the ages of 8 to 12 years, was used to delineate the stressors and coping behaviors. Homeless, family, self, peer, school, and violent behavior were the stressor categories derived from content analysis. The children expressed more stresses in the homeless, family, and self categories than in the other 3 categories. The coping behaviors from the content analysis were categorized by using Ryan-Wenger's (1992) coping taxonomy. The majority of the children's coping responses were in the social support, cognitive avoidance, and behavioral distraction categories. Nurses should assess each child's stressors and coping behaviors when providing care to homeless children, and assist the child in alleviating some stressors by strengthening one's coping behaviors. Copyright © 2001 by W.B. Saunders Company