Benchmark - Research Proposal Final Paper

6

SOCIAL ISSUE

How poverty affects members of a community

Jeanete, Freesene

SOC -480

How poverty affects members of a community

Introduction

Poverty is a social issue that refers to a person or a community that lacks all the resources that all members in the community need for them to have good living standards. Poverty affects all members of a particular community, even if they are not all poor. The needy members have low incomes that they cannot depend on; hence they rely on other community members for their wellbeing from time to time. (Umanailo, M. (2020). Poverty in communities is caused by several factors, like many people living in a small area with limited resources, unemployment, and the lack of capital to start and maintain their businesses. Inadequate education of people living in a community will contribute to them being poor because they do not have the necessary skills to manage the little they have and develop comfortable lives.

Needs assessment worksheet 1

Hypothesis	Independent variable	Dependent variable	Direction of hypothesis	Population
EXAMPLE: As the level of activity (low to high) increases, the level of mental wellbeing (poor to excellent) increases among older adults.	Level of activity	Level of mental wellbeing	Positive	Older Adults
As the level of community social support decreases, the number of petty crimes increases among teenagers.	Level of community social support
	Level of social support	Level of social adjustment	Positive	Returning veterans
How poverty affects the members of a community.	Poverty	Members of a community.	Positive	All members of the community

Needs assessment worksheet 2

Social issue: Poverty

Research method: surveys, observational methods, and case studies

Explanation of method: Surveys are done to collect data from several respondents from the community to determine their ways of living, income, and whether they are lacking or not. Observational methods involve making observations on the community members for some time to determine the level of poverty in that community. Case studies are done on particular families and groups of people to represent the whole community. The results will tell the level of poverty in the community.

Compose the final draft of your research question: How are the community members affected by poverty?

Explain your proposed research method (50-75 words): we will use several research methods to collect data that will be used to determine how poverty affects those in that community. Surveys, observational techniques, and case studies will be done on selected community members to collect data that will determine how all the community members are affected by poverty. These methods will help organize all the evidence needed from the community to have all the facts and even uncover new information by researching more on the collected points.

Explain your proposed research design (50-75 words): The research design used is quantitative research. There is a systematic investigation of all the factors that lead to poverty and the effects and poverty on the community. The data collected was quantifiable and was used to determine the overall results mathematically or computed into graphs or pie charts to determine the various relationships between factors that lead to poverty and their effects.

Literature review

Poverty in communities is caused by a lack of nutritious food and nutritional information about their food. The lack of adequate infrastructure makes people unable to produce goods and services that can be used to earn them a living and support their families. Poor living conditions in a community negatively affect their mental and physical health since they are not in the best need to work or think about the way forward. (Thornton, K. D. (2018). Poverty is caused by many factors leading to food insecurity as well as homelessness and substandard living conditions. People living in poverty can quickly spread diseases among themselves without getting the proper care they need because they cannot afford healthcare services. Alternatively, healthcare costs keep getting higher, but since they cannot afford these services, their conditions keep getting worse, thus deteriorating their living conditions.

The Christian worldview can influence the prevention of poverty and helping the poor by encouraging everyone, whether Christian or not, to follow the teachings of the bible and help each other in the community to live better lives. It can sensitize people to cooperate when working together to provide the community's critical needs and help eliminate poverty. People need constant encouragement that no situation is permanent. Through hard work, they will one day overcome poverty and manage to live better lives, and the Christian worldview is responsible for such encouragements and helping people raise their hopes of better lives.

A social worker with a Christian worldview will help alleviate poverty in the community by providing the most urgent basic needs to the needy members of the community. These social workers can provide necessities like food, clothing, and shelter as more help is expected to come from the Christian worldview. The social workers can also offer other services like healthcare and education by joining hands with other social offices in the community. Above all, these social workers encourage the community members to work harder and slowly manage to escape from poverty and live better lives. (Parkkonen, J. (2017). By using their knowledge and skills, social workers help improve the low-income families' situations by addressing their social problems, solving the most pressing needs, and following other requirements later. Social workers also mobilize other community members to help the less fortunate by donating some items to them, thus making them feel more comfortable.

We found out that six out of every ten families investigated were lacking in a particular community due to some varied factors among these families. Other factors were consistent, which was then identified as the leading cause of poverty for the residents of those communities. The topmost cause of poverty was the lack of jobs and employment opportunities among family members, followed by the lack of education by the same members. (Nelson 3rd, C. A. (2017). Climate change contributed to their poverty since they could not predict the patterns of favorable climate to use to cultivate crops both for consumption or for sale to earn them more money for their upkeep. Other families had specific conflicts within themselves, which led to other members becoming estranged and not managing to provide for themselves. The inequality in the society creates divisions by making other members belong to a wealthy class while others are of an inferior class.

Conclusion

Poverty is a menace that society has tried its best to eliminate in various communities but to no avail. Poor people in the community live a different life than the rest of the community, thus leading to their isolation because of their social status and standards. Various organizations, people, and churches have all joined hands to help eradicate poverty in the community. (McFarland, B. H. (2017). It is essential to eliminate poverty to improve the living conditions of all community members so that no one among them feels inferior to another member. For poverty to be eradicated almost wholly, members of a society should have access to good livelihoods and be given opportunities to work and earn a living for themselves. The government and other organizations should provide all the needed services and easy access to those services to help people overcome the effects of poverty and fight poverty.

References

Jensen, S. K., Berens, A. E., & Nelson 3rd, C. A. (2017). Effects of poverty on interacting biological systems underlying child development. The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health, 1(3), 225-239.

Kerr, W. C., Kaplan, M. S., Huguet, N., Caetano, R., Giesbrecht, N., & McFarland, B. H. (2017). Economic recession, alcohol, and suicide rates: comparative effects of poverty, foreclosure, and job loss. American journal of preventive medicine, 52(4), 469-475.

Thornton, K. D. (2018). Power Politics and the Representation of Poverty: The Nottingham Community Protection# Givesmart Campaign. Visual Culture in Britain, 19(2), 237-254.

Umanailo, M. (2020). Measuring Poverty for the Community. Available at SSRN 3530258.

Wahlbeck, K., Cresswell-Smith, J., Haaramo, P., & Parkkonen, J. (2017). Interventions to mitigate the effects of poverty and inequality on mental health. Social psychiatry and psychiatric epidemiology, 52(5), 505-514.