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This study aims to explore whether the working parents' perception about the necessity of childcare centres for their work efficiency is associated with their anxieties and concerns related to their dual responsibilities, i.e. providing proper parental childcare and maintaining work efficiency.

A sample of 100 employed parents, from the Jashore region of Bangladesh, was surveyed, and descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyze the data.

It was revealed that there is a strong association between the perceived negative impact on job performance, childcare, child development, work efficiency and perceived need for a childcare centre.

The limitation of this study is that it was confined to Jashore University of Science and Technology. The results may differ from those of the study conducted outside this study area and the methodology used here.

This study has significant practical implications for employers, childcare service providers and policy makers, especially in Bangladesh. The employers will be able to understand the demand for childcare services centres among the employed parents in respective organizations. It will draw attention of employers of knowledge intensive industries and grants commission to the issue of conflict of work and childcare-related responsibilities of employed parents. This will also make employers conscious about the dilemma that is undergone by employed parents motivating them to take actions for minimizing such conflicts to ensure better job performance of working parents.

Based on this study, childcare providers and other policy makers will be able to ascertain the potential size of the childcare market and determine the requirement for investment in childcare-related human resources development. As the work and childcare responsibilities compete for limited time of working parents, either childcare or job performance suffers. This causes concerns, anxieties or remorse, which again hampers the job performance further. Therefore, this study may motivate the university authority around the world, specifically those in Bangladesh, to provide childcare facilities for its faculties, students and other employees.

This study contributes to the literature on growing demand for centre-based childcare services in an emerging economy context. It provides evidence of high demand for on- and off-site childcare centres to enhance work efficiency of working parents.

The purpose of this qualitative study is to identify and highlight the challenges faced by the dual-career couples with one or multiple child/children in maintaining their work–family balance based on family systems theory.

The author purposely selected 26 families (52 participants) in Bangladesh where both husbands and wives work on a full-time basis having one or multiple child/children. The author used focus group discussion (FGD) technique to identify the challenges encountered by them.

After summarising the FGD results, the study identified several challenges faced by those dual-career couples, such as inability to differentiate between professional and family lives, lack of quality time for partners/children, challenges to raise children, lack of childcare centres and lack of professionalism of care workers; and tension and anxiety for their child/children while at offices.

The author expects the results of this qualitative study to be conductive as groundwork for upcoming research studies concerning dual-career couples with child/children. The author also hopes that such results will assist the human resource managers in efficiently crafting and executing some policies regarding dual-career couples with one or multiple child/children.

Though daycare centres are built to facilitate children's social and physical growth, divergent stakeholder perceptions yield conflicts while managing risks for each space due to the minimal guidelines in the Republic of Korea. Due to the unclearly defined knowledge and experience gap between representative stakeholders, teachers have difficulties in operating it with high satisfaction. This study therefore was conducted to systematically identify which parts of performance should be increased to preferentially increase end-user satisfaction in limited resources.

This research conducted quantitative analysis gradually. Importance–performance analysis (IPA) grasped the perceptions of construction practitioners and end-users after identifying space composition and representative risks of daycare centres. Based on the factors influencing perception differences, principal component analysis and structural equation modelling (SEM) were conducted to determine which space improves the performance preferentially to increase overall end-user satisfaction.

As the utilisation of indoor spaces increases after COVID-19, improvement of indoor spaces except for indoor playroom is necessary, especially, advancement of the quality of teachers' rooms.

Outputs by reflecting the end-user experiences support to understand which spaces are managed from the limited resources.

Theoretical framework for daycare centre was established in Korea where guidelines were insufficient, and differences in perception of each risk of stakeholders were identified. Moreover, gradual statistical analysis was set to construct end-user-focused centres by extracting where the performance of space should be improved in prior.

Iron deficiency anemia (IDA) is the most common nutritional anemia in the world and a pervasive health problem, especially in developing countries. Children under two years of age are more prone to be affected by IDA. The best strategy to prevent and treat IDA is to use iron supplements. This study aims to examine the factors associated with noncompliance (such as non-utilization or inconsistent usage) of iron drop supplementation among infants between 6 and 24 months old.

Online databases (PubMed, Scopus and SID) were searched to retrieve relevant articles published from inception up to July 2023. Among the 2,177 articles detected, after removing duplicate and irrelevant titles, 21 cross-sectional studies that met the authors’ inclusion criteria were included. Screening for articles and data extraction were conducted separately by two researchers.

The findings suggest that some factors related to mothers, such as education, knowledge, attitude and performance; some factors associated with child such as child’s gastrointestinal and dental complications; taste and smell of iron drops; and birth order and gender are the main determinants of adherence to iron supplementation.

It can be proposed that the most significant factors affecting the feeding of iron drops to children under the age of two include: the level of mother’s awareness, socio-economic status of the household and the occurrence of digestive complications following the supplementation. Given these observations, adopting proper policies toward improving the nutritional awareness of mothers and producing iron supplements with minimal side effects seems crucial.

The purpose of this study is to assess psychological distress among parents of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), self-esteem as a predictor of such distress and the effect of coping strategies.

A descriptive correlational study design was conducted using a convenient sample of parents of ASD children (N = 93).

This study revealed that the parents of an ASD child experienced a high level of anxiety (M = 15.89), a moderate level of depression (M = 15.85) and a mild level of stress (M = 16.86). Parents of ASD children also reported a low self-esteem score (M= 13.27). Mothers of ASD children reported higher levels of psychological distress, lower levels of self-esteem and more frequent utilisation of maladaptive coping strategies than fathers of ASD children.

Parents of children with ASD experience a significant level of psychological distress; however, this may be improved by developing programmes and psychological interventions focused on improving parents’ self-esteem and using more active coping strategies.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study conducted in Saudi Arabia that predict the psychological status among family caregivers of an autistic child.

Lead is a well-established environmental contaminant that over the last 50 years has become recognized as a neurotoxin with its greatest concern for the developing child (i.e. both in-utero and postnatally). What is problematic is that children exposed to lead often come from lower socioeconomic status (SES), are largely Black communities and are further at increased risk for developing adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). The literature on ACEs had focused much on trauma, single parenting, child abuse, lack of finances and stress, etc., but has not considered the intersectionality of these ACEs as risk factors within environmental neurotoxic exposures such as lead poisoning. This is important as most low SES communities are Black. In particular, within the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA), Black families have been neglected of proper lead-abatement to their apartments for nearly 70 years.

This is a viewpoint/perspective paper that examines the lived experiences of Black folxs in NYCHA through a Black critical theory (BlackCrit) and antiblackness framework pertaining to ACEs, and lead poisoning within the NYCHA system of New York City. This perspective paper draws upon the last three years of news reports, five decades of publicly available data sets from NYCHA and the comptroller to raise an awareness of how Black children are treated by NYCHA generation after generation which can be argued as a mass atrocity against NYCHA residents. Furthermore, the systematic and institutionalized racism and environmental injustices by NYCHA and the state can also be considered as a crime against humanity. As such, BlackCrit could help to position awareness, advocacy and knowledge about Black folxs residing in NYCHA to achieve fair, safe and affordable public housing to experience Black joy across future generations.

Thus, rather than civic and state government response efforts focusing their full attention and resources to serving and supporting individuals affected by ACEs they should equally consider the environments in which Black people live and also allocate funds proportionally to address these areas often overlooked. Moreover, proportions of these funds should be redirected especially to lead-abatement and removal of known sources of lead exposures, evaluation of suspected sources of lead exposures (i.e. drinking water, baby food and formula, children’s juice and cereal products, superfund and other waste sites, electronic recycling plants, etc.) and accompanied by all affected children undergoing full and comprehensive neuropsychological testing and follow up studies paid for by the state. The goal should have two fundamental objectives: (1) accepting accountability for failing to address these preventable neuropsychological issues directly affecting Black children generation after generation and (2) offering the proper waived or reimbursable supports and resources to help Black children sustain the best quality of life (QOL) trajectory possible when diagnosed with lead poisoning.

The manuscript is a viewpoint/perspective paper grounded in BlackCrit and an antiblackness framework. There are ample public news reports and public data available from NYCHA on these matters over the last three years. However, the scope of this paper was not to delve too deep into these numbers per se, but rather to address the concerns leading up to and arguably contributing to, at least in part, to these numbers of lead-exposed Black children in NYCHA. Lead poisoning has never been considered as an ACE and its relationship to mass atrocity research is novel which may pave a new avenue for research of this kind through the utility of BlackCrit and antiblackness framework to support and advocate for change so that Black children can be provided with a basic human right of safe housing and experience Black joy.

BlackCrit has not been used in the context of lead poisoning research. Mostly individuals and families of middle- and low-income have been studied in the context of poverty and lead poisoning. However, many people who live in poverty, in public housing, within New York are Black. Thus, Black children are generation after generation exposed to unaddressed lead-abatement and it appears that now more than ever BlackCrit should become the framework for how this work should be discussed in the literature to raise awareness to state governments regarding Black folx's persistent lead poisoning, NYCHA's neglect and mass atrocity research as a long overdue advocacy effort to bring the necessary voice, authentic narrative, and actual knowledge of the lived experiences of Black families in NYCHA with lead poisoning.

The goal of this viewpoint/perspective paper should have two fundamental objectives (1) NYCHA and New York State accepting accountability for failing to address these preventable lead poisoning issues directly affecting Black children; and (2) offering the proper support and resources to help Black children sustain the best QOL trajectory possible when diagnosed with lead poisoning.

Lead poisoning research has never been approached through a mass atrocity and BlackCrit framework and perspective. This is the first report on bridging these fields within the context of NYCHA public housing neglect of lead-abatement and continued poisoning of current and future generations of Black children. This failure of NYCHA lead-abatement contributes annually to economic loss in New York State for many years to come which could be entirely avoided.

This research aims to examine the relationship between the physical environment and neuropsychological perception in children with Asperger’s disorder.

This study through mixed qualitative–quantitative approaches conducted strategies including a survey and case study. Accordingly, multiple methods were applied to collect data including semi-structured expert interviews (20 persons) and questionnaires (N = 400). The sampling strategy of questionnaire participants was random clustering and the target population was children with Asperger from Iran Asperger Support Associations. Besides, the sampling strategy for the participants of semi-structured expert interviews was non-random and purposeful. The collected data from the participant’s questionnaires and interviews were analyzed by Porsline and Excel software and content analysis, respectively.

Based on the relationship between the physical environment and neuropsychological perception, the results of the research indicate that despite all existing differences between the two spectra of hyper-sensitive and hypo-sensitive behaviors, it is possible to design architectural spaces responding to their common needs and satisfy both spectra.

This research on to healing aspect is quite new and contributes significant information about health issues in building design. This study tries to derive and examine the supportive characteristics of architectural spaces that integrate special physical and effective designs to improve the healing process of children with Asperger’s disorder.

The purpose of this study is to explore the design of outdoor play spaces in Cairo that provide an enjoyable play experience, along with opportunities for enhancing child social and cognitive developmental skills through play features incorporated in their play spaces to achieve this goal.

The study adopts a qualitative methodology to examine the effectiveness of natural, customized and elevated features on social and cognitive play behaviors of 6–8 year-olds. Data were gathered in three different play settings; a play space inside a social club, a park and a schoolyard. Data gathering relied on observations, written descriptions of play patterns and recordings of children's conversations. Additionally, the researcher utilized sketching diagrams to illustrate children's preferences for play with each feature.

The results of the study indicate that incorporating natural, elevated and customized play features into children's play spaces can enhance their environment and provide opportunities for fostering their social and cognitive skills.

This study reports the occurrence of indicative behaviors and not the exact measurement of skill development. Research involving children can have limitations in terms of reliability of results due to slight variations affected by unmeasurable circumstances.

The study makes a valuable contribution towards enhancing the quality of children's play spaces in Cairo by emphasizing the significance of providing opportunities for social and cognitive in addition to physical play.

This study aims to explore the information needs of Chinese parents of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and how these needs evolve as their children develop.

This study collated 17,122 questions regarding raising children with ASD via the Yi Lin website until November 2021.

The information needs of parents of children with ASD were classified into two categories: 1) Cognition-motivation: related to children with ASD; and 2) Affection-motivation: related to their parents. Child development causes the adaptation of information needs of these parents. Within the first three years, nine different topics of these parents' information needs were identified. Major information needs at this stage are as follows: intervention content, intervention methods and pre-diagnosis questions. During the ages of three to six years, there were 13 topics of information needs for parents, focusing on three areas: intervention content, intervention methods and diagnosis and examination. There are eight topics of information needs post six years. Parents are more concerned with the three topics of intervention content, life planning and intervention methods.

This novel study indicates the complex and changing information needs of parents of children with ASD in China. It may enhance the understanding of the information needs of these parents at theoretical and practical levels, provide support for them to understand their own information needs and provide a reference for relevant government and social organisations to provide targeted information services for them.

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/OIR-04-2022-0247

Child friendly space (CFS) has been introduced worldwide as an effective Child Protection response to the affected children in emergency to restore their life through psychosocial support programs. An effective physical environment is crucial to accommodate the psychosocial activities of a CFS. Several guidelines have stated minimum standards regarding design and implementation of a CFS. However, different case studies show that the physical set-up of CFS varies in different contexts. Therefore, there is a scope to analyze the physical environment of CFSs in the context of Rohingya camps based on those standards.

Very few guidelines have solely discussed the criteria of physical design and implementation of a CFS. First, the study develops an assessment tool by sorting out those standards from available sources. Secondly, the study follows multiple case study research approach to assess physical environment of four CFSs in Rohingya camps, Cox’s Bazar based on those standards using direct observation, photographic analysis and key informant interview as survey tools.

Major findings reveal that local factors such as topography, availability of land and density have great impact on physical environment on CFSs in Cox’s Bazar beyond the minimum standards, which indicates the importance of considering local factors while designing a CFS for a given context.

Solely demonstrates the need of considering the benchmarks as well as local factors, which will contribute to the knowledge of policymakers and implementers during designing and implementing a CFS for a specific context.