Differences of Developments of children age 1 - 5 years in Bangkok vs. North Region of Thailand.

Abstract

Background : Children age 1 - 5 years in Thailand are the future of the country. They were born in different regions of the country; few studies have been done regarding child development, and comparative studies of child developments in different regions of Thailand.

Objective : To study and compare child development and its associated factors in pre-school children age 1 - 5 years in Bangkok and the Northern Region of Thailand.

Design : Comparative studies.

Setting : Bangkapi, Bangkok and Li, Lamphun pre-school

Materials and Methods : Data were collected from 260 children: 130 from Bangkok and 130 children from Lamphun, aged 1 - 5 years old. TDSI (Thai developmental skills inventory) and questionnaire was used for data collection. Descriptive statistics used were Hypergeomatric Distribution, Chi-square and Fisher’s exact test.

Results : This study showed no differences in child development between both regions. As for fine motor development, in Bangkok factors influencing child development were living with both parents and parents’ marital status (p <0.001) and children in nuclear family (p = 0.011) whereas in Lumphunis children living with parents’ marital status (p = 0.005). As for receptive language development, in Bangkok a factor influencing child development was children playing mobile games more than 3 hours per day (p = 0.025). As for expressive language development, in Lamphun factors influencing child development were maternal smoking before pregnancy and during parenting (p = 0.034 and p = 0.025). As for personal and social development, in Lamphun factors influencing child development were maternal smoking and drinking during pregnancy (p = 0.038 and p = 0.031)

Conclusion : The study showed no differences in child developments aged 1 - 5 years in both regions.