Predicting Permanency Intentions Among Kinship Caregivers

This study examines kinship caregivers’ (n = 830) experiences and their perceptions of the children (n = 1,339) in their care in order to predict permanency intent. Permanency intent is a caregiver’s expressed intent to adopt the child in his or her care or to provide permanent, legal guardianship. The results of this study reveal that most caregivers’ permanency choice is guardianship and not adoption. However, binary logistic regression results uncovered six factors (i.e., thorough explanation of case plans, decreases in caregiver emotional stress, decreases in child depression, child lack of communication with birth parent, caregiver providing care for a sibling group, decreases in run-away behavior) that predict that a caregiver will adopt the child in his or her care. Policy, practice, and research implications are noted.