Children in Bangladesh
International survey exploring children’s well-being in Bangladesh.
Dr Haridhan Goswami completed fieldwork for this international survey. Using a child-centric approach, this survey, for the first time in Bangladesh, gathered data from over 3,000 children (aged 8 to 12) who assessed the level of happiness in different aspects of their lives including school, family, friends, neighbourhood, safety, material conditions, health, leisure, and freedom. This project was part of an international consortium of researchers from over 40 countries who carried out a survey on children’s subjective well-being in collaboration with Children’s Worlds.
The study aimed to collect solid data on children’s lives and daily activities, their time use and in particular on their own perceptions and evaluations of their well-being. The purpose was to improve children’s well-being by creating awareness not only among children, their parents and their communities, but also among opinion leaders, decision makers, professionals and the public. The project in Bangladesh, led by Dr Goswami (Dept. of Sociology, Manchester Metropolitan University, UK), has academic partners from University of Rajshahi (Professor B. K. Banik, Dept. of Sociology) and Govt. B M College (Dr M. Ibrahim Khalil, Dept. of Sociology). North South University became dissemination and impact building partner for this project. This three-year long project (2016-2019) received funding from Jacobs Foundations, CCYJR, and QR GCRF.
Dr Goswami presented the key findings of the survey in a seminar hosted by the School of Humanities and Social Sciences (SHSS) at North South University in Bangladesh on 6th December 2018. In this seminar titled ‘How happy are the children in Bangladesh? Results from a national survey for shaping child well-being policies‘, he focused on factors affecting children’s and young people’s lives and discussed policy implications of the survey results for improving child well-being in Bangladesh.