By Latrishka Thomas
Poor parenting skills, family size, home discord, child maltreatment, and antisocial parents are risk factors linked to juvenile delinquency across the globe.
And, according to Youth Probation Officer Nakitia Williams, Antigua and Barbuda isn’t much different.
In an interview on ‘Mental Health Talk Antigua’, Williams said that in her nine years of working with delinquent youth on the twin islands, she too has noticed that most of her clients come from dysfunctional families.
“As you know, families are the first socialisation agency and once that agency is not proper then it has a trickle-down effect on all aspects of that child’s life.
“A lot of these children are exposed to violent behaviour at home and a lot of these children come from single parent households where there is limited supervision … the children are just left to ‘live life’; there is no proper guidance, no proper discipline,” she explained.
Williams also stressed the importance of a child having a positive father figure.
“Majority of my clients I can say do not have their father in their life. I always tell people a mother cannot show a son how to be a man. She can try her utmost best. I know a lot of persons may disagree but she cannot teach her son how to be a man,” she said.
The probation officer went on to emphasise the need for parents and guardians to assist their children in getting over trauma.
“You don’t just get up one day and decide to be a criminal; there are things that happen in your life, adverse childhood experiences or ACE as I like to call it,” she stated.
Williams went on to give the example of a child whose parent has died. She said that, much like adults, it is traumatic for a child and if it is pushed aside as a trivial matter “these events tend to manifest into anger”.
She called for childhood trauma to be taken seriously.
“A lot of children do not get the help to cope or to deal with these traumatic events that they go through. That is something that we really need to focus on,” she stressed.
Delinquent youth has been a major topic of late with new teen gangs appearing across Antigua, and said to be behind a number of violent attacks on fellow youth.
The police, parents and education officials have had talks surrounding the issue.