The Psychosocial Effects Of People Living With HIV/AIDS At The Niger Delta University Teaching Hospital Okolobiri, Bayela State Nigeria (Published)
The psychosocial effects of the people living with HIV/AIDS have been acknowledged in sociological literature with few or little empirical study to justify its consequences on the affected people in contrast to its biomedical effects. This paper acknowledges that the biomedical consequences of people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) is still essential, but focuses more on the psychosocial effects of PLWHA that aggravate their health conditions. Engel’s biopsychosocial model was utilized as analytical framework and a descriptive research design for the study. One hundred and fifty (N=150) respondents participated in the study in a chain-referral technique at the Niger Delta University Teaching Hospital, Okoloibiri Bayelsa State using a structured questionnaire as instrument of data collection. Frequency and percentage distribution tables were used to present and analyzed the quantitative data collected for the study using SPSS version 17.0. Findings showed that there were psychosocial effects that aggravate the conditions of PLWHA ranging from depression and perhaps self-destruction arisen from stigmatization, discrimination, denial, loss of relationships and social disarticulation among others. The paper concluded that though the biological determinants of the transmission of the disease need to be emphasized and discouraged among people of the society through campaign and sensitization across board, but more emphasis and attention should be laid on efforts to embrace those already affected with HIV/AIDS by eradicating all forms of stigmatization, discrimination, deprivation through love and supports for them rather than disarticulating them from the members of the society.
Keywords: HIV/AIDS, Loneliness, Stigmatization, loss of relationships, social disarticulation and supports
THE IMAGE OF THE AFRO-AMERICAN IN FENCES (1985) (Published)
August Wilson’s major concern is to sympathetically put on stage the black experience and thus to arouse the community’s awareness for such experience. His black characters are always in constant quest for self-realization and for an authentic identity. Consequently, focuses on encouraging the blacks to rediscover their identities and to maintain self-authentication. He believes that the only way for the African Americans to transcend the limited existence in white racist America is by recovering their Africanness; by recognizing and accepting their African roots. He is keen on reminding the African Americans of their cultural heritage and their identity that has been maintained for ages despite their painful sense of alienation and their separation from their African culture. To Wilson, the African culture and heritage should not be an element of inferiority; rather it must be an evidence of pride because Afro-Americans have their own cultural distinctions: they have their own customs, music, food, clothing, language, rituals of marriage and funerals which are different from the whites’. Thus, he gives a complete record of the black world and culture, and urges, moreover, blacks to be proud of their distinct cultural heritage.
Keywords: Cultural Heritage, Loneliness, Racism, rediscovering self-identity