The negative effect of child labour on academic performance of secondary school students in central senatorial district of Cross River State-Nigeria

Abstract

The desire to provide research information about the prevalence of child labour, its effects and educational factors was the focus of this research. The focus of this study is on child labour as an aspect of child abuse and neglect. The goal of the research on child abuse and academic performance of children who participate in it as a routine scholars and people have defined child labour in several ways. In a nutshell it is the exploitation of children, premature assumption of adult roles on the part of children; working long hours for low wages in the central senatorial district in Cross River State of Nigeria, the study has two main purposes: To determine the factors, which influence students involvement in child labour and lastly, to compare the relationship between child labour and academic performance of those who are engaged in the activities with those who do not. The data used in testing the hypothesis were gotten from the post-test scores of all the subjects. Hypotheses were tested at .0.5 level of significance. Based on the results of the hypotheses, the following recommendations were made. Thus, it is time that the Federal, State and Local Governments embark on mass enlightenment campaigns to expose the bad side of driving children into child labour. This could be done through the use of mass media, schools and social welfare establishments to educate parents/guardians over the dangers of exposing their children to child labour as an act of child abuse. Government should stop mass retrenchments and unemployment of parents to ease poverty.

Keywords: Child labour, Abuse, Academic performance and Effect