Sulimani-Aidan Yafit
Bob Shapell School of Social Work Tel Aviv University Tel Aviv Israel.
Child Fam Soc Work. 2022 Apr 23. doi: 10.1111/cfs.12927.
The ongoing COVID-19 global health crisis has both short- and long-term implications for the lives of young adults worldwide, especially young adults from vulnerable communities. The current exploratory study is the first, to our knowledge, that investigates the impact of the pandemic on the lives of at-risk young adult Arabs, who are part of a national minority group in Israel. Twenty-eight at-risk young adults aged 18 to 25 participated in semistructured interviews regarding the experiences, challenges and barriers they faced as emerging adults during the pandemic. Grounded theory analysis and theoretical thematic analysis were used to analyse the interviews. Findings revealed that the pandemic and the policy decisions made in its wake influenced the young adults' lives in primary areas including their financial and occupational status, their social ties and social support networks, their relationships with their biological families and their future plans and goals. The study's findings shed light on the complex reality of at-risk young adults during the pandemic and emphasize the increasing vulnerability of this cohort. The challenges they face as members of a collectivist society and of a national minority group are discussed. Implications for policy and practice highlight the need to increase these young adults' occupational and financial opportunities and to design holistic services that take into account their personal and sociocultural characteristics.
持续的新冠疫情全球健康危机对全世界年轻人的生活产生了短期和长期影响，尤其是来自弱势群体的年轻人。据我们所知，当前这项探索性研究首次调查了疫情对以色列国内少数族裔群体中有风险的年轻阿拉伯人的生活所产生的影响。28名年龄在18至25岁之间有风险的年轻人参与了关于他们在疫情期间作为新兴成年人所经历的事情、面临的挑战和障碍的半结构化访谈。采用扎根理论分析和理论主题分析对访谈进行分析。研究结果显示，疫情及其引发的政策决策在主要方面影响了年轻人的生活，包括他们的经济和职业状况、社会关系和社会支持网络、与原生家庭的关系以及未来计划和目标。该研究结果揭示了疫情期间有风险的年轻成年人的复杂现实，并强调了这一群体日益增加的脆弱性。文中讨论了他们作为集体主义社会成员和国内少数族裔群体所面临的挑战。对政策和实践的启示突出了增加这些年轻人的职业和经济机会以及设计考虑到他们个人和社会文化特征的整体服务的必要性。
