Beyond Benign Neglect

The research and action programme titled Positive Deviance in Nutrition and Child Development has been sponsored through the Tufts University School of Nutrition by UNICEF New York and the Joint Nutrition Support Programme of the Italian Government and was carried out in three countries - Nicaragua, Indonesia, and Nigeria - over a period of four years. In each country, the project had three phases. Phase I was made up of field research. Phase II involved design of action programmes and materials based on the results of Phase I, while Phase III implemented the programmes designed by Phase II. The Nigerian collaborative project, entitled Child Development for the Computer Age, focusing on preschool children, was conducted in Lagos and Ogun States by the Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Lagos in conjunction with Tufts and as part of UNICEF"s Child Development Project in Nigeria. This text presents results of the cross-sectional survey, ethnographic study and psychological...