When Muhammed, a 7-year-old, arrived in Canada as a refugee, the world around him felt unfamiliar and overwhelming. He struggled to connect with others, navigating a new language, culture, and social environment that made him feel out of place. While adults face challenges in resettlement, the impact on children—whose identities are still forming—can be even more profound. Muhammed’s experience reflects a broader reality faced by many newcomer children, showing why there is an urgent need for research that helps children build belonging, resilience, and long-term well-being. 

Why Refugee Children Need Focused Research

While research examining the impacts of challenge and adversity on child development is growing, a notable gap remains in the literature addressing refugee children. Unlike their non-refugee peers, refugee children often face unique and compounded challenges—such as displacement, trauma, and cultural dislocation—that can significantly impact their mental health and developmental trajectories. Emotion regulation, the ability to manage and respond to emotions effectively, plays a critical role in supporting their well-being, yet teachers and caregivers may struggle to effectively respond to these needs without appropriate training or resources. The early experiences of children, like Muhammed, not only shape refugee children’s adjustment in elementary school but also influence their academic and social outcomes as they transition into higher levels of education.

Unique Challenges in Childhood Resettlement

Between ages five and twelve, children commonly face many stressors, but refugee children often carry additional challenges that affect their mental health in distinct ways. For example, Muhammed’s experiences before arriving in Canada—such as witnessing violence, losing loved ones, or being separated from family—are often different from those of native children. These stressors operate at multiple levels: they can affect the child directly, impact parents’ well-being, and shape the family environment.

Social-Emotional Skills and Mental Health

Dr. Ruth Speidel and colleagues at the Centre for Child Development, Mental Health, and Policy (CCDMP) at UTM examined how four social‑emotional skills—emotion regulation, sympathy, optimism, and trust—relate to refugee children’s mental health after resettlement by looking at two common patterns of difficulty: internalizing symptoms (things like anxiety, sadness, and withdrawal that happen inside a child) and externalizing symptoms (behaviors like aggression, acting out, or trouble paying attention that we see outwardly). These two types of problems give a simple way to understand a child’s emotional well-being: internalizing shows how much a child is struggling on the inside, and externalizing shows how those struggles might come out in behavior. The team tested whether stronger social-emotional skills might be linked to fewer of these problems and whether they could protect children from the effects of stressful experiences before migration.

Key Findings: Gender, Skills, and Protective Factors

This study found that boys showed more outward behavior problems (like aggression and impulsivity) than girls, a pattern seen in other child research. When discussing these differences, Dr. Speidel explained: “It’s possible that some underlying biological factors (e.g., temperament) may contribute to this difference, and it’s also likely that socialization contributes, as boys are often more encouraged to express anger or assertiveness more openly, whereas girls are often more socialized to regulate or suppress externalizing emotions.” Still, the study found that learning emotion regulation and empathy helped both boys and girls. Reflecting on these differences, Dr. Speidel emphasized that “parents and teachers [can] adapt strategies based on each child’s individual characteristics,” so interventions can be tailored to the unique needs of children.

Among the four social-emotional skills explored, emotion regulation, optimism, and empathy showed the strongest links to better mental health, with emotion regulation and optimism acting as protective factors. Trust, however, showed a different pattern. As Dr. Speidel explained, “Higher trust was unexpectedly associated with higher internalizing symptoms.” In this study, trust measured general trust in others, not close relationships. Forced migration and trauma may make broad trust less adaptive, while “maintaining trust within a smaller, close-knit circle (family, community) might be more protective.” Still, stronger emotion regulation and optimism were linked to fewer internalizing and externalizing symptoms, and higher empathy for others was linked to fewer outward behavioral challenges. These findings suggest that social-emotional skills generally support refugee children’s mental health, but the role of specific skills, especially trust, can vary depending on a child’s experiences and context.

The results of this study can be applied to inform refugee parents, educators, and even community and government leaders on how they can better support refugee children in identifying and managing their emotions to lead to better post-migratory experiences.

Supporting Children Through Educators and Families

When Muhammed first entered his classroom in Canada, everything felt new and overwhelming—the people, the language, even the way school worked. A caring teacher might take time to talk with him, helping him understand and express his feelings. As Dr. Speidel explains, teachers need the right tools and knowledge to respond with care and understanding, especially when children have faced difficult experiences before coming to Canada.

Her research at the CCDMP found that three main skills—emotion regulation, empathy, and optimism—help refugee children manage emotions, connect with others, and stay hopeful. Activities like drawing, storytelling, mindfulness, positive-reframing, or role-playing allow children to practice expressing feelings and understanding others.

In recent intervention research, Dr. Speidel’s team found that when parents and teachers understand children’s emotional needs, they become more patient and supportive, creating calmer, more caring environments. With this support, refugee children gain emotional skills, confidence, and a stronger sense of belonging.