ABSTRACTThe study’s goal was to discover the psychosocial challenges of teenage motherhood in senior high schools and the coping strategies they adopt to deal with those challenges. The study is qualitative research that employed the phenomenological design. The population for the research was teenage mothers of 13 years and above …
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ABSTRACTThe study’s goal was to discover the psychosocial challenges of teenage motherhood in senior high schools and the coping strategies they adopt to deal with those challenges. The study is qualitative research that employed the phenomenological design. The population for the research was teenage mothers of 13 years and above pursuing senior high school education. The research data was generated via a semi-structured interview guide. Purposive and snowball sampling methods were employed to choose the subjects for the study. The study unearthed that the teenage mothers in the schools experienced some psychological challenges such as sadness, anger, stress, depression, despair and worry. The study also discovered the following social challenges: lack of support from teachers, ostracism, mockery and stigmatization experienced by the participants. Again, the study unraveled that the participants experienced emotional challenges such as worry, shame, frustration, sorrow, annoyance and moodiness. The participants adopted goal/objective setting, withdrawal from peers, modeling, ignoring critics and encouragement to deal with their challenges. The social and psychological challenges made them have poor interpersonal relationships with their classmates and therefore became reserved and introverted. The study recommends that the Ministry of Education through the Ghana Education Service (GES) should vigorously pursue guidance and counselling programmes at the senior school to enable this category of students to have a safe net to help pursue education to the level that their intellectual abilities can take them. It is also recommended that social support programmes such as LEAP and the Disability Fund be expanded to cover teenage mothers to enable them take care of their children.
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