Children’s Narratives of Family Life in Ghana: A Cultural Lens via Story Stems

Abstract

A Western worldview pervades the social and psychological study of children. The current study employed a story-stem method to qualitatively explore the daily and family life experiences of young Ghanaian primary school children in urban Ghana through their story narratives. The recorded narratives of 69 5- to 8-year-old children were elicited through presenting stems of common child-caregiver scenarios and thematically analysed. Five overarching themes were identified: daily routines and concerns, child-caregiver interactions, spirituality, death-related fears and depictions, and responses to injury. The narrative themes reveal the likely mental and physical occupations of these children, as characterized by household chores, financial concerns and school concerns, as well as underlying cultural values through their portrayals of parenting values, parental discipline and spiritual beliefs. Story stems depicting common childhood problems (e.g. knee injury) sometimes evoked death and hospitalization subthemes following an escalation of health problems. Possible interpretations for these findings are discussed, taking into account cultural, developmental and emotional factors. Story stems are a promising and developmentally appropriate tool for qualitative analysts to investigate the experiences and worldview of young children in non-Western cultures.

Pubertal status and body image: An inquiry into experiences of adolescents in Ghana and Kenya

“…Ghana was a former British colony for about eight decades up until 1957, and consequently, there are still British influences in the culture and education. The official language spoken is English although there are over 50 local languages, ethnicities, and dialects (Hosny et al., 2020). With the multiple ethnicities and also migrants from surrounding countries, Ghana is heterogeneous, but the different ethnicities share common collectivistic cultural values such as interdependence, family, and respect for older adults (Heim et al., 2019).…”

“…With the multiple ethnicities and also migrants from surrounding countries, Ghana is heterogeneous, but the different ethnicities share common collectivistic cultural values such as interdependence, family, and respect for older adults (Heim et al., 2019). This is especially true of the capital, Accra (where the current study took place), which, due to urbanization, has influences from various ethnic groups both from within the country and neighboring countries (Ghana Statistical Service (GSS), 2020; Hosny et al., 2020).…”

Conceptualizations of Effective Parenting: Perspectives of Religious Counselors in Ghana

“…Other studies have examined the dimension of warmth in Ghanaian parenting from the perspectives of parents (Osei-Tutu et al, 2018) and children (Hosny et al, 2020). Osei-Tutu et al found that Ghanaian parents were less likely to use verbal expressions of warmth and affection.…”