Unraveling the complexity of children’s thinking about poverty: Upper elementary school children’s perspectives on its causes and solutions

This study examines children’s perspectives on the causes and solutions to poverty in upper elementary school. Participants were 248 fourth-grade children (8 to 11 years old) enrolled in public schools in northern Portugal. Children participated in individual interviews. Following a mixed-methods approach, data analysis involved a qualitative phase (thematic analysis) and a quantitative phase (non-parametric statistical tests). Children mentioned naïve or fatalistic, individualistic, and contextual causes and proposed naïve or unrealistic solutions, remediating actions by the individual, remediating actions by others, self-reliance actions, and a call for social change. Children who mentioned contextual causes stated a higher number of causes overall. Children highlighting individualistic causes suggested more individual remediating solutions, while children stating contextual causes proposed more remediating solutions by others. Both were equally likely to offer self-reliance individual solutions. All children advocating for social change identified contextual causes. Results are discussed, shedding light on the complexity of children’s thinking.