Consequences Of Child Abuse On Students Academic Performance As Perceived By Secondary School Teachers
[A CASE STUDY OF ILORIN METROPOLIS]

Indicators for Identifying Victims of Child Abuse
There are various ways of identifying people who had been abused. Children may exhibit a wide range of reactions to expose to abuse. Young children (e.g., preschool and kindergarten) oftentimes, do not understand the meaning of the abuse they observe and tend to believe that they “must have done something wrong.” Self-blame can precipitate feelings of guilt, worry and anxiety. It is important to consider that children, especially younger children, typically do not have the ability to adequately express their feelings verbally. Consequently, the manifestations of these emotions are often behavioural. Children may become withdrawn, non-verbal, and exhibit repressed behaviours such as clinging and whining. Eating and sleeping difficulty, concentration problems, generalized anxiety, and physical complaints (e.g., headaches) are all common.
Unlike younger children, the pre-adolescent child typically has greater ability to externalize negative emotions (i.e., to verbalize). In addition to symptoms commonly seen with childhood anxiety (e.g., sleep problems, eating disturbance, nightmares), victims within this age group may show a loss of interest in social activities, low self-concept, withdrawal or avoidance of peer relations, rebelliousness and oppositional-defiant behaviour in the school setting. It is also common to observe temper tantrums, irritability, frequent fighting at school or between siblings lashing out at objects, treating pets cruelly or abusively, threatening of peers or siblings with violence (e.g., “give me a pen or I will smack you”), and attempts to gain attention through hitting, kicking, or choking peers and/or family members. (Ahmed 1996).
Effect of Child Abuse
Studies indicate that every day a significant number of children are exposed to serious maltreatment and neglect leading to physical and psychological injury and serious long-term consequences. Researchers are continuously examining the wide range of potential consequences of child abuse and neglect. Mounting evidence suggests that, in addition to the immediate negative effects on the children, maltreatment is associated with a host of problems manifested in adolescence and adulthood. The effect could range from psychological effects, physical effects, behavioural consequences, effect on academic performance, effect on sexuality, spiritual consequences.
Psychological Effects
Child abuse may permanently alter the psychological well being of a child. Following maltreatment, children are known to display the following problems:
•    Extreme and repetitive nightmares.
•    Anxiety.
•    Unusually high levels of anger and aggression.
•    Feelings for guilt and shame- for sexually abused victims this can be quite severe, especially if the victim experienced some degree of pleasure during part of the abuse.
•    Sudden phobias, such as a fear of darkness or water.
•    Psychosomatic complaints, including stomachaches, headaches, hypochondriasis, faecal soiling, bed wetting and excessive blinking.
•    General fearfulness and a specific fear of others of the same gender as the abuser.
•    Depressive symptoms, long bouts of sadness, social withdrawal.
•    Self-reported social isolation and feelings of stigmatization.
After continued exposure to maltreatment, children may develop further psychological complications:
•    Significant increase in rates of psychiatric disorders.
•    Dissociation, intrusive thoughts, suicidal ideation and more acute phobias.
•    More serious levels of anxiety fear depression, loneliness, anger, hostility and guilt.
•    Distorted cognition, such as chronic perceptions of danger and confusion, illogical thinking, inaccurate images of the world, shattered assumptions about the world and difficulty determining what is real.
•    Decreased effectiveness in comprehending complex roles.