Displaying 1 - 10 of 10
Republic of North Macedonia in the last several years undergoes comprehensive social protection reform. The reform processes have been focused on furthering the processes of deinstitutionalization, decentralization and pluralization of social services delivery.
The transformation of social protection institutions has been one of the key priorities in this period, specifically out-of-family services for children. In this respect, alternative care services for children without parents and parental care has been strengthened and promoted. Foster care as a traditional form of protection has…
Parental education programs are a key element in achieving family reunification because they help mothers and fathers improve their parenting skills and increase the parent-child relationship. Perceptions of change are examined among children and parents who participated in Spain’s “Caminar en familia” (“Walking family”) program, which was implemented among families served by the Sistema de Protección a la Infancia y a la Adolescencia (System for the Protection of Children and Adolescents).
A qualitative design enabled comprehensively describing the experiences of families in the Spanish…
Family foster care (FFC) is the preferred out-of-home care measure for the protection of children and youth through Europe, in accordance with research findings of its superiority in meeting developmental needs of children and youth. Portugal, however, does not accompany the European trend in the implementation of FFC. Even after changes made to the law, prioritizing FFC, it represents only 2,7% of out-of-home placements. The main goal of this exploratory and descriptive study is to understand the perceptions of Portuguese child protection professionals concerning FFC. 101 participants, from…
Children need stable and safe relationships with caring adults to thrive, and such relationships are far more likely to be created in a family environment. Those growing up in alternative care have very often experienced significant trauma before being placed in care. Residential care, in particular, can expose them to all the risks associated with social exclusion if it is not equipped to give them the tailored support they need.
That is why it is important to know the proportion of children placed in residential care compared to those in placed in formal family-based care. This would…
Abstract
Objective
Violence against children is a global public health concern. Researchers are increasingly using self-report measures of physical, psychological, and sexual violence and neglect for population-based surveys. The current gold-standard measure, the 45-item ISPCAN Child Abuse Screening Tool has been used across the world. This study assesses its adequacy for measuring abuse across countries.
Methods
Multiple group confirmatory factor analyses were used to assess the configural, metric and scalar invariance of the measure across nine Balkan countries. Data were…
This document is intended to provide concrete advice on how to put the guiding principles common to most child protection actors into practice. Though cultural traditions and customs may require the advice to be adapted to the specific context, the authors believe that the advice provided is grounded in sufficiently broad experience to guide measures that ensure children under five are not separated when this can be avoided, and, if separated, can be reunited with their families as quickly as possible.
Related:
- …
Abstract: Although lacking in official figures, latest reports from NGOs highlight that Greece has over 85 institutional settings that house more than 2,500 children, excluding unaccompanied minors entering the system continuously for the past few years. Given the impact that institutional care has been found to have on psychological and cognitive outcomes, the authors make the case for the adaptation of Early Childhood Child Care HOME (EC-CC-HOME) a world-renowned instrument that assesses children’s child-care environment. In this instance, we have adapted the child-care version of HOME to…
Abstract
Residential care (RC) in Portugal accounts for almost 90% of out-of-home placements of children. Since the Youth Self-Report (YSR) and the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) are the most commonly used psychological (mal)adjustment screening instruments, it is important to analyze their comparative validity specifically in the context of RC. This study aims to analyze the comparative effectiveness of YSR/SDQ as screening tools of psychological (mal)adjustment, looking for differences in the way psychological problems and difficulties are identified by these two measures…
The Childonomics project has developed an instrument that can help to reflect on the long-term social and economic return of investing in children and families. The instrument provides an approach to economic modelling that can be used in a number of ways to inform decision-making. It enables consideration of the different types of costs of services and approaches that support children and families (particularly those in vulnerable situations) and links them to the expected outcomes of using these services.
The…
The purpose of this report is to create a strategy for assessing the status and progress of child welfare reform in CEE/CIS countries using the best available quantitative and qualitative information. The assessment focuses on children without permanent parents who are in state care, which includes true orphans and social orphans. Traditionally in the region, such children were cared for by the state in several types of residential institutions. A major component of child welfare reform, however, includes providing family-care alternatives, which may incorporate non-relative foster care,…