Displaying 1 - 10 of 76
Abstract
Children from some black and minority ethnic (BME) backgrounds are routinely placed with substitute carers who do not match their cultural, linguistic, religious and ethnic backgrounds. The shortage of foster carers and adopters of specific backgrounds means that the demand in the care population often outweighs the availability of matched placement options. While the shortages of BME foster carers and adopters are widely recognised, there is virtually no research into the barriers faced by specific BME groups, so there are no informed recruitment strategies to increase the pool…
Abstract
Research focused on relationships and contact with birth family for children and young people who were separated from them as infants has rarely acknowledged the emotional and dynamic nature of such interactions. Curiosity has been dominant in adoption research. However, in our longitudinal study of young people who entered care at a young age, a range of other feelings and combination of feelings emerged in the youths’ narratives, including contentment and mixed feelings such as anger, affection, loss, guilt, or worry. Type of placement, that is, whether the young people had been…
Abstract
A growing body of literature has consistently shown how adopted children often have previous history of trauma and neglect, and in turn develop negative representations of the self and others. This study assesses the internal representations of three groups of children, as measured by the Story Stem Assessment Profile (SSAP). These were: (1) a maltreated, late-adopted (MLA) sample (n = 63); (2) a non-maltreated, early-adopted (EA) sample (n = 48); and (3) a non-maltreated community sample (COMM) (n = 80). In addition, it examined whether MLA and EA adopted children’s attachment…
Abstract
Background
Children adopted from care are more likely to have experienced early adversity, but little is known about the impact of early adversity on later post-traumatic stress (PTS) symptoms.
Objective
To investigate sub-groups of adversity in a sample of adopted children and examine the association with later PTS symptoms.
Participants and setting
A study of British children adopted from care using social worker records (N = 374) and questionnaire-based longitudinal study of n = 58 children over 4-years post adoptive placement…
Abstract
This article charts the UK history of contact in fostering and adoption as it relates to looked after children and their birth relatives. It builds on a recent publication in this journal by one of the authors based on her research on the use of social media by children in care. Here we look at previous practices relating to the question of whether or not contact ought to be ‘allowed’ in which words such as ‘access’ were used, betokening the child as object. We also come up to date with reference to contemporary efforts to recast contact as ‘family time’ that is significant in the…
This briefing paper reports key findings from a recent study of direct contact between adoptive families and birth relatives within the four nations of the UK. The study involved secondary analysis of a data set generated from the Adoption Barometer, a largescale annual survey of adoptive parents conducted by Adoption UK (n=3,470). The analysis focused on data relating to actual direct contact between adoptive and birth families in 2018, and anticipated future direct contact. The key purpose of this study was to compare experiences of adoptive families across the four nations of the United…
Abstract
This article charts the UK history of contact in fostering and adoption as it relates to children in care and their birth relatives. It builds on a recent publication in this journal by one of the authors based on her research on children in care and their use of social media. Here we look at previous practices relating to the question of whether or not contact ought to be ‘allowed’, in which words such as ‘access’ were used betokening the child as object, and we come up-to-date with reference to contemporary efforts to recast contact as ‘family time’ and being of significance in…
Muslim beliefs and practices with regard to the adoption of children and foster care is currently a subject of increasing attention. Besides various circumstances that can leave many Muslim children in the care of social services, the urgent needs of unaccompanied minors coming to the UK and Europe from war-torn countries have highlighted particular challenges. Meanwhile, legal issues related to the definition of adoption and its Islamic alternative (kafala) remain a longstanding problem, often resulting in families divided across borders. Responding to such concerns, Muslim…
Abstract
Significant concerns remain in many countries about the high numbers of children needing an adoptive placement relative to the low numbers of prospective adopters, the high level of long-term therapeutic support needs for many adopted children and their families, and whether there are appropriate services to meet them. There has been an increase in ‘priority’ children waiting over 12 months to find a family. These are often children aged four years and over, in care with siblings, with additional needs or developmental uncertainties and from minority ethnic backgrounds. The…
This article explores changes in policy and practice in children’s services over the past 40 years and discusses the thinking that has underpinned them. Together with a special journal supplement introduced by John Simmonds, it marks the 40th anniversary of BAAF (the British Association for Adoption and Fostering), which was founded in 1980 and in 2015 joined the long-established Coram charity to form CoramBAAF Adoption & Fostering Academy.