Age at placement and adult adopted people's experience of being adopted

Older age at placement has long been recognized as a risk factor in successful adoption outcomes. The findings of the present study emerged as part of a larger study that looked at the adoption experiences and reunion outcomes of 472 adults who had either searched for or been sought by one or more of their birth relatives. As part of the investigation, adopted adults were asked to evaluate their adoption experience. Age at placement was used as a key variable in examining whether or not adopted people felt different to their adoptive family, felt they belonged in their adoptive family, and felt loved by their adoptive parents while growing up. Respondents were also asked to evaluate their overall experience of being adopted. Older age at placement significantly increased the risk of adopted people viewing major aspects of their adoption experience with either mixed or negative feelings.     

Children with an imprisoned parent: children's and caregivers' narratives

Previous studies have found that children may experience adverse effects from parental imprisonment. However, little research concerning this issue from children's perspectives has been undertaken in Hong Kong. In order to fill the knowledge gap, this study aims at exploring the challenges and resilience of children with a parent in prison. Nine children aged between 9 and 11 years with a parent in prison, and their caregivers, were interviewed. Their life experience and feelings during parental imprisonment were explored. The caregivers were asked about changes in the children's behaviour and resilience in the children. Children reported that they experienced academic stress and psychological distress, including sadness and problems in having to conceal their parent's imprisonment. They benefited through positive thinking, holding religious beliefs and talking to trusted persons. For caregivers, children's conduct problems, psychological distress and suppression of feelings were reported as the challenges children faced, while object hitting for venting emotion, religious beliefs and engagement in activities were reported as helping children to cope. The article concludes by making a number of recommendations concerning the provision of services, including the establishment of mutual-aid self-help groups, mentoring programmes and programmes promoting the importance of positive thinking for the children, and trainings for caregivers on understanding children's needs, as well as public education on the social stigma of parental imprisonment.     

Parent–Child Emotional Communication and Children's Coping in Middle Childhood

Parent–child communication regarding children's negative emotions and coping were examined in a sample of 75 5th graders (53% boys) and their mothers and fathers. We predicted that emotionally open communication between a parent and his or her child would be related to children's use of constructive coping strategies. Parents reported on how they react to their child's negative emotions, and children reported on how much they share their negative feelings with each parent. Additionally, emotional communication was measured during a parent–child discussion task involving an event that was upsetting to the child. The results indicated that emotional communication, as reported by mothers, fathers, and children, as well as mother–child observed communication, were related to children's coping strategies. The findings point to a need to assess emotional communication using multiple measures that tap both the child's and the parents’ perspectives and that use different methodologies.     

Children's and adolescents’ conversations with mothers about offenders’ and victims’ responsibility for harm in their experiences of being hurt by a peer

This study investigated mothers’ and children's constructions of meaning about responsibility for harm in conversations about two experiences when children were hurt by a peer and felt they had either contributed or not contributed to the situation. The sample included 105 Canadian mothers (75% White) and their children (53 girls, 52 boys) across three age groups (M ages = 6.92, 11.14, 15.89 years). Overall, mothers and children emphasized different aspects of responsibility; mothers made more evaluations of acts and discussed the avoidability of harm whereas children referred more to hurtful acts, consequences, reasons, and subsequent responses. Discussions of the child's and peer's responsibility were responsive to the child's perspective on events. The child's responsibility for self-protection was particularly emphasized by mothers and when the child felt they had not contributed to the situation. Children more often mitigated their responsibility as compared to their mothers, and older children referred more to their own and their peer's responsibility for harm. Findings illuminate how conversations with mothers may inform children's judgments of their own and others’ roles in peer conflict.     

Ascertaining the wishes and feelings of young children: social workers' perspectives on skills and training

The research was undertaken in the context of the ongoing debate about child care social work training and children's participation. Its aim was to explore the views of qualified child care social workers about their skills in eliciting the wishes and feelings of younger children and the relevance of social work training for this task. Questionnaires, focusing on their skills and training, were completed by 70 UK child care practitioners from the Children and Families Court Advisory and Support Service, voluntary agencies and local authorities. On average, practitioners felt able to ascertain the feelings and wishes of children as young as 4 years old. Nevertheless, at qualifying level, only 30% had training in communicating with young children, 16% in ascertaining children's feelings and wishes, and 66% in child development. Many had subsequently relied on in‐service training and their own initiatives to acquire further skills and understanding. In conclusion, most participants were experienced practitioners working in supportive organizations and had developed considerable communication skills. However, concerns remain because they identified deficits in child care social work qualifying and post‐qualifying training. Consequently, more effective training at all levels is required if social workers are to engage younger children successfully and facilitate their participation.     

Parents' roles and question‐asking during pretend and real activities

All activities—real and pretend—provide children opportunities to learn new facts and skills, and parents are often facilitators. Yet little is known about whether and how parents' roles and interactions differ during pretend versus real activities. Here, we examine whether parents self‐report adopting different roles during pretend and real activities and whether we observe changes in their behavior, in particular in their question‐asking; either could impact the potential learning opportunities available to children. Thirty‐two parents engaged their 4‐year ‐olds in one pretend and one real activity (cleaning and snacking, counterbalanced). They self‐reported their roles, and speech was transcribed and coded. Parents regarded their role as a partner in fun during pretend and as a teacher or monitor during real activities. Across pretend and real contexts, they mostly asked information‐seeking questions, followed by rhetorical and pedagogical questions. They asked significantly more questions during pretend than real activities, particularly rhetorical questions. During real activities, parents' roles were not related to the number or types of questions they asked. However, during pretend, their roles were related to the number of rhetorical questions they asked: Monitors asked significantly fewer than teachers. Possible complementary benefits of each activity based on patterns of roles and questions are discussed.     

Conflict Outcome as a Function of Parental Accuracy in Perceiving Child Cognitions and Affect.

It is usually maintained that positive family functioning and internalization of parental values are promoted by parents' consistent use of particular discipline strategies or styles of childrearing. In this paper a different position is presented, viz., that parents who can accurately perceive their children's thoughts and feelings during a disagreement will have the most successful outcomes because they can tailor their disciplinary interventions to the particular states of their children at the time. Adolescents and their parents were interviewed about recent disagreements and asked to rate themselves and their partner on measures of anger, blame, acceptability of their own and their partner's behavior, and satisfaction. In families where fathers were accurate in their perceptions of their adolescent's cognitions and affect there were fewer conflicts per week. Accurate perception on the mothers' parts was related to their satisfaction with the outcomes of the disagreements. There was no relation between adolescents' perceptual accuracy and number of conflicts or their satisfaction with the outcomes.     

‘It's so much better than contact’: A qualitative study exploring children and young people's experiences of a sibling camp in the United Kingdom

This article explores children and young people's experiences of a sibling camp based in the United Kingdom. Sibling camps are an intervention based on children's activity holidays that aim to promote meaningful contact for siblings separated in public care. This study adopted a qualitative approach using semi‐structured interviews with 11 children and young people; this included one sibling group of three and four sibling groups of two. The children's ages ranged from 8 to 17 years old, and they had all attended at least one camp with their sibling. Findings highlighted how the children valued the extended time they could spend with their siblings at camp, and how they felt this enabled them to better understand their siblings and improve their relationships. Findings also showed how the children developed close supportive relationships with the staff at the camps, who ensured they were cared for, and they also supported them with managing their relationships, which some participants acknowledged at times could be challenging. The participants also valued spending time with other sibling groups who also experienced separation. The study found camps provided a space for these children to maintain links with their siblings and to strengthen their sibling bonds.     

Negative Feelings and Help Seeking Among Older Adults With Chronic Conditions

Older adults with chronic conditions are at greater risk of negative affect, though few studies have focused on older adults’ perspectives on how chronic conditions affect their mental well-being. This study involved in-depth interviews that explored how older adults describe their feelings about chronic conditions, the context within which they experience these feelings, and their experiences with help-seeking for negative feelings. Participants reported that older adults experience a range of negative feelings related to their conditions and are only comfortable talking to people who understand their everyday experiences with managing chronic conditions. The findings have implications for health self-management.     

Intergroup Evaluations and Norms about Learning Ability

Children's evaluations of classmates with learning difficulties tend to be less positive than their evaluations of classmates without learning difficulties; but it is not clear if these evaluations are associated with age, group norms, and group identification. These associations were examined within the context of inclusive elementary school classrooms. Participants (N = 192) were asked about their attitudes and their peers' attitudes towards children with or without learning difficulties. They were also asked to evaluate fictional target children who gave biased or unbiased opinions about children with or without learning difficulties. Results showed that group identification was predicted by age and group judgment. Participants with high group identification and judgment scores in favour of children without learning difficulties were inclined to believe other children would be similarly biased. However, most participants preferred the target child who gave unbiased opinions. Theoretical and educational implications are discussed.     

What children want to know about in‐ and out‐groups,and how knowledge affects their intergroup attitudes

One of the key factors contributing to the development of negative attitudes toward out‐groups is lack of knowledge about them. The present study investigated what type of information 3‐ to 4‐ and 5‐ to 6‐ year‐old Jewish Israeli children (N = 82) are interested in acquiring about unfamiliar in‐ and out‐group individuals, and how providing children with the requested information affects their intergroup attitudes. Children were shown pictures of individuals from three groups—an in‐group (“Jews”), a “conflict” out‐group (“Arabs”), and a “neutral” out‐group (“Scots”)—and were asked what they would like to know about them. The experimenter responded by either answering all of children's questions, half of the questions, or none. Children's attitudes toward the groups were also assessed. It was found that children asked the most questions in regard to conflict out‐group individuals. Moreover, the older age group asked more questions regarding the psychological characteristics, and fewer questions regarding the social identity, of the conflict out‐group than of the other two groups. Finally, full provision of information improved attitudes toward the groups, especially among 3‐ to 4‐year olds, and especially regarding the conflict out‐group. These findings have implications for understanding the sources of intergroup biases, and for developing interventions to reduce them.     

Children's narratives of sexual abuse

Children rarely disclose sexual abuse. Hence, studies of children's abuse experiences are relatively rare. This paper reports on a qualitative analysis of 2986 cases of self‐disclosure of sexual abuse from children, aged 5–18 years, who contacted ChildLine Scotland, a free, confidential telephone counselling service. Children discussed their feelings regarding the abuse, the impact of abuse on their health and well‐being, sources of support, disclosure, coping strategies, the context in which abuse occurs and the various ways in which they were groomed or their compliance in abuse was gained. Children's narratives contained detailed contextual information on their experiences of sexual abuse, perpetrators of sexual abuse and the circumstances in which sexual abuse occurs. The way in which children communicated about sexual abuse was found to differ quite considerably, and the terminology they employed was often markedly different from adult constructs. Nonetheless, children of all ages were able to describe their experiences and their feelings around the abuse in considerable detail. This study provides a rare insight into children's accounts of sexual abuse. The findings illustrate the profound impact that sexual abuse has on the lives of children and their understandings of the circumstances in which abuse occurs.     

The Influence of Gender and Ethnicity on Children's Inferences About Toy Choice

By 4–5 years of age children can make gender‐congruent inferences about toys. Not only do they respond differentially to gender labels attached to toys, even without such labels they make inferences about toy choice that reflect an awareness of and identification with their gender in‐group. However it is unclear how far inferences about toy choice extend to other aspects of a child's social identity. The present study explored the influence of both gender and ethnicity on children's judgements on toy choice for themselves and others. Eighty‐four children in three age groups (5, 6–7, 8–9 yrs) were shown photographs of unfamiliar toys and unfamiliar children from three ethnic groups (white, black, Asian) and were asked to rate how much they and these children would like each toy. Boys consistently predicted that Asian children would like the toys less than other ethnic groups. Ethnicity influenced inferences from 6–7 years old where children predicted that white, black and Asian peers would like the toys differently from each other. Children at 8–9 years old predicted that Asian peers would like the toys less than both white and black peers. Analysis of differences between children's own liking and predictions for same‐ and opposite‐sex others revealed that they were gendercentric. That is, children predicted that a same‐sex child would like a toy more similarly to themselves compared to an opposite‐sex child. Analysis between white and Asian children's own liking and predictions for same‐ and other‐ethnic others found that only 6–7‐year‐olds made ethnocentric inferences. That is, same‐ethnic peers’ liking was rated more similar to children's own compared to that of other‐ethnic peers. Findings are discussed in light of cognitive developmental theories and previous work on the development of perspective‐taking skills.     

Older Workers in Intergenerational Child Care

Thirty-four older workers in one of five intergenerational child care settings participated in a study exploring the effects of their participation in intergenerational child care programs. The purpose o the study was (1) to identify and describe a sample of older child care workers and (2) to identify characteristics of the older child care workers or the work experience which significantly impact on their lives. The older workers completed a written questionnaire, standardized life satisfaction scale, and interviews. The results suggest that participation in intergenerational child care programs supports the notion of generativity and enhances productive aging. Older workers reported increases in feeling needed, valued, and a sense of self-worth, and increased social contact. Over 90% of the older workers reported that their job expectations were met and that they felt the children had benefitted from their work. Positive changes in attitude about children's growth was positively related to the older workers' personal growth. Older workers also reported greater personal growth when they worked in excellent child care centers as compared to good or fair quality centers. Younger teachers reported positive changes in the classroom environment with the presence of older workers. These findings have implications for training older adults as child care workers and for social policy issues concerning older citizens' roles in our society.     

The feeling of tiredness among Swedish parents: a longitudinal cohort comparison

Nilsson K. The feeling of tiredness among Swedish parents: a longitudinal cohort comparison Int J Soc Welfare 2010: 19: 424–432 © 2009 The Author, Journal compilation © 2009 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and the International Journal of Social Welfare. In Europe, there is an ongoing debate on how to combine work and family life, a problem many women face today. Implicit in this debate is that women are more affected by having children compared with women in earlier generations. This article presents a cohort study on how Swedish women and men's reported feelings of tiredness is affected by having children. Longitudinal results representing three cohorts show that both men and women in general report more feelings of tiredness in the early 2000s compared with the 1980s. Being a first‐time mother or father is connected with more feelings of tiredness among the latest cohort studied. However, when control variables are included, the effect of becoming a first‐time parent weakens, especially for men. Finally, the effect of becoming a first‐time mother is no longer significant when controlling for age.     

Combating Conflicting Messages of Values: A Closer Look at Parental Strategies

This study examined how parents respond when their children encounter values outside the home that conflict with family values. Forty‐eight middle‐class European American parents completed questionnaires consisting of 11 vignettes asking how they would respond to hypothetical situations where outside sources posed potential conflicts with parental values to their adolescent child (M age of child=13.33 years). We identified five strategies that parents might use: controlled cocooning, reasoned cocooning, compromise, pre‐arming, and deference. Parents in the study enlisted all five strategies, with reasoned cocooning and pre‐arming occurring most frequently. The self‐reported importance of values to parents was the most important predictor of which strategy parents used, with parents using more controlling strategies to defend values that were most important to them. Importance of values also mediated the relation between religion and the parent's self‐reported desire for the child's compliance on personal issues, and parental strategy choice. This study is among the first to examine alternative parental strategies for regulating children's values acquisition outside the home, and shows that the extent of parental control is related to the importance of specific values to the parent.     

Social Workers' Perceptions of Training Preparedness and Social Justice Norms on Workplace Empowerment

This study examined the relationship between (a) social workers' perceptions of preparedness to perform in their professional roles and perceived social justice behaviors at work and (b) workers' sense of workplace empowerment. A sample of 152 currently licensed social workers responded to web or mailed surveys. Respondents were more likely to perceive having workplace empowerment related to meaning in their work if they reported their social work program training prepared them for their professional roles. Perceived social justice behaviors at work were associated with workers' experiencing empowerment related to the impact they had at work. Social workers' sense of training preparedness and experiencing social justice at work can positively influence workers' perceived empowerment. Enforcing the importance of engaging in social justice with clients in social work education, both in class and in field placements, has the potential for long-lasting effects on empowerment in students' future workplaces. Agency-level management should ensure continuity in social justice activities to enhance feelings of workplace empowerment, which may help social workers connect with clients. Future research should examine elements of social work programs that promote feelings of empowerment in order to understand how the same approach can be used in models of continuing education and organizational management.     

Evaluating SafeCare® in Israel: Benefits for the families

SafeCare® is a home‐based intervention programme targeting parents of children up to 5 years old and is designed to reduce and even prevent child abuse and neglect. Here, we present an evaluation of a pilot trial of SafeCare® in Israel, examining family's outcomes. We examined parents' behavioural changes resulting from the three main modules of SafeCare®: the Health, Safety, and Parent‐Child/Infant Interaction. We also studied the unplanned effects of SafeCare® by examining maternal depressive symptoms. Participants were 46 mothers with children identified as being at risk of neglect by the local Department of Social Services who completed the programme. The mothers filled out questionnaires at the beginning and at the end of their participation. After completing the programme, mothers' self‐reports showed changes in how they would treat a sick child, an increase in feelings of competency, and a decline in symptoms of depression. We thus conclude that SafeCare® helped the participating mothers, enhancing their feelings of competency and changing several of their behaviours.     

The Helpfulness of Holistic Arts–Based Group Work with Children Living in Foster Care

This article discusses practice-based research that is exploring the helpfulness of holistic arts–based group work for the development of self-awareness and self-esteem in children living in foster care. The group program is arts based and encourages children to explore their beliefs, feelings, and behaviors. Examples of group exercises are provided, challenges in developing this group program are discussed, and qualitative research findings are presented, which are based on the analysis of fifteen 6-week groups. Findings indicate that children learned new skills, improved coping abilities, connected with feelings, and felt more positive. Practitioners are encouraged to consider how arts-based group work can help children in care.     

An Experimental Analysis of Children's Dislike of Aggressors and Victims

We experimentally examined social contextual factors that might moderate children's dislike for aggressors and for victims of aggression, by varying both the aggressor's behavior (aggressive toward multiple children versus aggressive only toward one child) and the victim's behavior (passive versus assertive). Children (117 male and female fourth to sixth graders) listened to one of four scenarios describing the experiences of boys at a summer camp and rated how much they liked the aggressor, the victim, and the other children in the scenario; children also reported how much they thought the aggressor, victim, and others liked each other. Overall, and consistent with previous research, children disliked aggressors the most, followed by victims and then by the other children in the scenarios. Importantly, children's liking was influenced by the social context in which the aggression occurred, particularly in regards to how the victim responded. Aggressors (general or focused) were liked more if their victim was assertive rather than nonassertive. Furthermore, children liked nonassertive victims less than assertive victims, particularly a nonassertive victim in response to a general aggressor. Inferred liking among the group members also was dependent on the social context of the provocation. This research highlights the need to consider aggression as more than a set of behaviors. Aggression is a social event embedded within a social context and interpersonal relationships must be considered.