Lifeline Online: E-Counseling And The Well-Being Of Overseas Filipino Workers And Their Families

By: Ma. Regina M. Hechanova (Philippines)



Learn about the Project

This project aimed to study the effects of ICT as a means of providing social support for Filipino Overseas Contract Workers (OFWs) and their families. To accomplish the research goal, a website will be developed and put up where OFWs and their families can interact with each other, or seek psychosocial assistance from trained counselors.

With the help of the Department of Information Systems and Computer Science of the Ateneo De Manila University, a website was developed initially hosted in the university site. The website was operational inJuly 2009. However, bandwidth and connection problems prompted the team to re-design and transfer the site in November 2009 to its current location (http://ofwonline.net).

This research project examines the experience of online counseling from three perspectives: the counselees, the counselors and OFW and family non-users. Data from counselees was in the form of counseling transcripts. Two focused-group discussions were conducted with counselors. Finally, interviews with OFW/family non-users to determine reasons for non-use.

The first phase of the study enabled the creation of a framework to explain adoption of online counseling. In this second phase, this model was tested quantitatively by surveying OFWs. Surveys with Filipino OFWs reveal that gender and location significantly differentiate the severity of problems. Females report more problems than male OFWs. OFWs in the Middle East report more problems than those in Asia. Results suggest that problem severity has significant positive associations between intent to seek counseling and intent to seek online counseling over and above that accounted for by gender and location of work.

This project aims to do two things: utilize the internet as a means of obtaining information on the concerns and issues of overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) and their families and examine the effectiveness of the internet in enhancing the wellbeing of OFWs and their families through ecounseling and internet-mediated communications. The study utilizes a field-experiment design with the intervention being the provision of internet communication and e-counseling to a selected group of first-time  OFWs. Measures of wellbeing will be taken prior to departure and six months into the assignment. Scores of the experimental group will be compared to that of a control group who are now given the internet training as well as those who have been on assignment for more than one year. The study hypothesizes that OFWs who received internet training, and e-counseling will report greater wellbeing and quality of family relations compared to those who do not.  At the same time, the internet-mediated communication with the counselor and between family members who utilize the  portal designed for the OFWs will be content analyzed to elicit the themes and concerns of OFWs and their family members. This project will be conducted within a period of one year with three months devoted to the preparation (recruitment of participants and training), six months devoted to the intervention and  three months devoted to analysis of data.

Findings

This study examined the factors that influence the intent to seek face-to-face and online counseling among overseas Filipino workers (OFWs). A survey among 223 OFWs reveal that OFWs are more likely to seek face-to-face counseling for problems related to friends, loneliness, cultural adjustment and online counseling for problems related to dating, loneliness, and cultural adjustment. Contrary to hypothesis, there was no relationship between help-seeking attitudes, gender, social support with intent to seek face-to-face or online counseling. However, men had more positive attitudes towards use of technology. Support was found for the hypothesis that intent to seek face-to-face counseling would mediate the relationship between problem severity and intent to use online counseling. No support was found for the moderating role of attitudes towards technology adoption.

PI’s Current Progress

REFLECTIONS ON THE PROJECT:

This project aimed to study the effects of ICT as a means of providing social support for Filipino Overseas Contract Workers (OFWs) and their families. To accomplish the research goal, a website will be developed and put up where OFWs and their families can interact with each other, or seek psychosocial assistance from trained counselors.

With the help of the Department of Information Systems and Computer Science of the Ateneo De Manila University, a website was developed initially hosted in the university site. The website was operational inJuly 2009. However, bandwidth and connection problems prompted the team to re-design and transfer the site in November 2009 to its current location (http://ofwonline.net).

This research project examines the experience of online counseling from three perspectives: the counselees, the counselors and OFW and family non-users. Data from counselees was in the form of counseling transcripts. Two focused-group discussions were conducted with counselors. Finally, interviews with OFW/family non-users to determine reasons for non-use.

The first phase of the study enabled the creation of a framework to explain adoption of online counseling. In this second phase, this model was tested quantitatively by surveying OFWs. Surveys with Filipino OFWs reveal that gender and location significantly differentiate the severity of problems. Females report more problems than male OFWs. OFWs in the Middle East report more problems than those in Asia. Results suggest that problem severity has significant positive associations between intent to seek counseling and intent to seek online counseling over and above that accounted for by gender and location of work.

The OFWOnline research project was a source of many insights both in terms of managing the project and conducting the research. From the perspective of project management, we soon realized we had failed to anticipate technological, connection and design issues that eventually lead to changing the site design and technology. In addition, the time zone differences and resource limitations also led to scaling down the project from on-demand service to one that utilized asynchronous communication. We also realized we had failed to budget for marketing and promotion of the site which was required to disseminate information about the site. However, we are happy to report that the site is still up and in its second year even if the funding has ended. From a research perspective, we were also able to present our experiences in national conferences and were able to publish an article in Media Asia.