Abstract:
Child abuse is a social problem as it affects the development of a state. This is because children who are supposed to be the leaders of tomorrow are abused physically, sexually, emotionally and are equally neglected. This has both short and long term consequences. The study was aimed at finding out how effective radio is in curbing child abuse in southeast Nigeria. The research project was anchored on agenda setting and spiral of silence theories. This research work utilized the survey research method and used the questionnaire as instrument for data collection to elicit information from the respondents. Data collected were analysed using SPSS, frequency distribution tables, graphs, charts and simple percentages. The study found out, among other things, that radio is relatively effective in combating child abuse. In other words, the effectiveness of radio in curbing child abuse is high but not very high. The result of the study shows that 38.3% said Yes that radio programmes are effective in combating child abuse, 20.1% said No while 37.5% could not say anything about the effectiveness of radio messages in combating child abuse and 4.2% did not respond to the question item. The study concludes that radio is effective in combating child abuse but its effectiveness is not overwhelming. Some recommendations include that child abuse programmes should be given more time, the programmes should equally be funded by government, people should also be encouraged to listen to radio programmes, corruption should also be fought to enable radio stations carry out their traditional social functions.
