Family group decision making and disproportionality in foster care: a case study

Research on the disproportionate number of children of color in the child welfare system suggests that we should focus on key decision points such as investigations, substantiations, and placements to understand how experiences of children vary by race and ethnicity. This article describes one community's efforts to use Family Group Decision Making in placement decisions to reduce disproportionality in foster care by diverting children from regular foster care services and keeping them within their extended families.     

The potential for successful family foster care: conceptualizing competency domains for foster parents

The potential to foster successfully starts with developing and supporting competency in 12 domains: providing a safe and secure environment, providing a nurturing environment, promoting educational attainment and success, meeting physical and mental healthcare needs, promoting social and emotional development, supporting diversity and children's cultural needs, supporting permanency planning, managing ambiguity and loss for the foster child and family, growing as a foster parent, managing the demands of fostering on personal and familial well-being, supporting relationships between children and their families, and working as a team member. This article describes each domain and reviews relevant research to help guide the assessment of practicing and future foster parents.     

Quality care for ill children: AIDS-specialized foster family homes

Children with AIDS and related complexes present a new and serious challenge to the child welfare field's foster care system. At this stage of the world's knowledge of AIDS and treatment capacity for its victims, the children are stigmatized as plague bearers, their viability is unknown, and few, if any, will ever have a home to return to. This article describes a special foster care demonstration in behalf of AIDS infants.     

Family to family: reconstructing foster care in the US

The public child welfare system in North America is faced with growing deprivation, rising numbers of children who need out-of-home placements for increasingly lengthy periods, and a shortage of foster carers. The Family to Family initiative offers public agencies funds and tools to help them strengthen family support services within the communities from which children enter the system, improve the quantity and quality of neighbourhood-based foster carers and develop the capacity to collect and analyse outcome data.     

Part of the family: Planning for permanence in long-term family foster care

There are concerns for the stability and outcomes for children in care amongst policy makers in England and many other countries. The goal of permanence for children separated from their birth families and in the care of the state has dominated child care policy and practice in the UK, the USA and Canada since the 1980s, but the meanings of permanence in terms of stability, emotional security and family membership into adulthood are complex and the placements and legal status thought best able to achieve permanence are contested.This research was an investigation of planning for permanence in long-term foster family care in England, where it is accepted by policy makers that this is a legitimate permanence option. The aim was to consider the fit between the planning and reviewing systems designed to achieve permanence in foster care and the reality of planned permanent placements as experienced by foster children and foster carers.Results suggested that although committed relationships within the foster family were helping children to feel a sense of permanence and to become part of the family, planning and reviewing procedures required by corporate parenting were often not adapted to the special nature of these foster placements. It was concluded that although planning and reviewing systems need to be rigorous, they also need to be more child and family sensitive in permanent placements.     

Predictors of running away from family foster care

Running away is a frequent but little studied phenomenon among adolescents in foster care. Repeated running from care often leads to premature discharge and homelessness for youth. This article uses cumulative risk theory in the context of normative adolescent development to investigate predicators of running away from foster care. Results indicate risks stemming from individual, foster home, and child welfare system sources, which offer some insight for prevention and intervention.     

The market for foster care: an empirical study of the impact of foster care subsidies

When parents are suspected of child abuse or neglect, their children may be placed with foster families. We estimate the relationship between the monthly subsidies paid to foster families and the quantity of foster care services provided. The empirical model uses variation in subsidies and foster care populations within 37 states and the years 1987–1995. One innovation in our approach is that we exploit the idea that states do not appear to set market clearing rates, as evidenced by a foster home shortage during this time period. In this case of excess demand, variation in the monthly subsidy traces out the supply curve. Our results show that states with high demand may be able to use economic incentives to recruit foster families.

Australian women and foster care: a feminist perspective

Viewing biological and foster mothers through a feminist lens would make fostering a form of care in which both women would share. One agency has put this into practice. This article describes how both groups felt about the experience.     

Crisis nursery services and foster care prevention: An exploratory study

ObjectiveTo examine whether receiving crisis nursery services reduces the chances of subsequent placement of children into foster care.MethodThe study includes a sample of 322 children from the administrative data from a crisis nursery in Ohio. Generalized estimating equations analysis was conducted to assess the relationship between crisis nursery services (case management and parenting education) and subsequent foster care placement.ResultsThe generalized estimating equations analyses indicated that case management and parenting education provided from the crisis nursery were associated with reduced likelihood of subsequent foster care for children who were placed in the crisis nursery. Foster care placement during the previous 12 months and Caucasian race were also associated with higher odds of subsequent foster care placement.ConclusionsCrisis nursery services delivered with case management and parenting education may be an effecive intervention to reduce children's subsequent foster care placement.     

Children placed in long-term family foster care: A longitudinal study into the development of problem behavior and associated factors

Due to prior experiences of trauma and abuse, many foster children have behavioral problems. The placement of the child in a family foster home is expected to reduce the behavioral problems. However, this expectation is seldom met and mostly behavioral problems increase or remain stable during placement. Research on the development of behavioral problems in foster children is scarce. Moreover, most of the research results are situated on a group level, which obscures the development of problem behavior on a case level. This study investigated the development of problem behavior of 49 foster children on a case level and the association of global, contextual, familial and child factors with the increase or decrease of problem behavior. Over a two year period 18 foster children had more, 23 just as much and 8 less problem behavior. An increase was associated with the use of more negative parenting strategies by the foster mothers. A decrease was related to the use of supportive parenting. Support of foster parents aiming at reducing the use of negative discipline practices and promoting the use of supportive parenting may have a positive effect on the development of foster children.     

Parental substance abuse and the development of children in family foster care

To determine the impact of parental substance abuse on children, the cognitive skills and behavior ratings of 268 school-age children placed in family foster care were examined. As a group, the children in family foster care presented with low average cognitive skills and made significant improvement in cognitive functioning during placement. The children with prenatal exposure to drugs scored significantly lower in cognitive skills at the beginning of placement but made significantly more progress than the other children during placement. Behavior ratings by the foster parents and teachers revealed that 29% of the children had scores in the significant range, and the children exposed prenatally to drugs had a higher incidence of behavior problems at school compared to family foster care peers. Recommendations for further study of these factors and for enhancing outcomes for children in care are provided.     

Health outcomes for adults in family foster care as children: An analysis by ethnicity

Studies have linked the experience of child abuse or adversity to health problems in adulthood, and researchers have long documented health problems affecting children in foster care. Yet, the adult health outcomes of maltreated children placed in foster care have not been sufficiently isolated. Although information on transitioning youth and young adults is now beginning to emerge, the impact of ethnicity on adult health outcomes has been largely ignored. Given the overrepresentation of ethnic minority children in foster care and the national disparities in the health of ethnic minorities, this study examined the relationship between ethnicity and physical health outcomes for African American, Hispanic, and White adults who experienced family foster care as children. Logistic regression models indicated that ethnicity was not a significant predictor of physical health (p > .05). However, gender and age were associated significantly with their physical health outcomes.     

Strategies for engaging foster care youth in permanency planning family team conferences

The present study examines strategies conference facilitators used to engage foster care youth in decision-making in the context of permanency planning family team conferences. Data collection included observations of permanency planning family team conferences, followed by interviews with foster care youth and conference facilitators. Data analysis focused on gaining a deeper understanding of how facilitators incorporate youth into decision-making, with a specific focus on the strategies they employed. Four strategies were identified in the analysis: creating a safe space, encouraging the youth voice, re-balancing power, and establishing a personal connection. The study's policy and practice implications, limitations and areas of further research are presented.     

The foster family in a systems theory perspective

Viewing the foster family as a social system provides another tangent from which to understand it, and adds credibility to familiar problems.     

Measuring outcomes in family support services (a case study using respite care)

Measuring outcomes in family support services is a relatively new area of social research. This study aimed to explore the use of respite care (brief planned periods away from home with the same carers over several months) as a family support service to help prevent long term family breakdown. It studied the service from the perspectives of all those involved in it—social workers, carers, parents and children–and was funded by the UK Department of Health as part of a series of studies commissioned to explore the implementation of the English Children Act law and theory.     

The biological children of foster parents in the foster family

This paper derives from a study of 15 biological children of foster parents, ages 6–12. While foster children have quite properly been the subject of much investigation, practically no research has explored the reactions of the foster parents' own children to the fostering experience. Findings of the study and examples from interviews will be cited which point to the possibility that these children exhibit, among other things, separation anxiety and superego conflicts related to fostering. Certain differences between the reactions of the younger (ages 6–8) and the older (ages 9–12) children will be highlighted.Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctor of Social Welfare degree at New York University School of Social Work, 1985. The author wishes to thank Dr. George Frank, Emily Shachter and Dr. Irving Steingart for their valuable suggestions.     

Perceived self-stigma in the utilization of mental health services in foster care and post foster care among foster care alumni

Foster youth experience higher rates of mental health disorders and receive higher rates of mental health services in comparison to the general population. Yet, upon foster care exit, mental health service use drastically declines. Little is known as to the reasons for mental health service decline after foster care exit. However, research studies in the mental health literature have consistently shown that self-stigma and public stigma are significant in mental health service receipt. Studies have also shown that self-stigma affects an adolescent's self-identity, self-efficacy, and interpersonal relationships, which impact self-sufficiency once youth leave foster care. This study explores self-stigma in the utilization of mental health services while in foster care, and whether the stigma developed while in foster care impacts mental health service use upon foster care exit. The role of public stigma in the utilization of mental health services post foster care is also examined. Thirteen former foster youth with a mental health treatment history while in foster care were interviewed. Results show that foster youth experienced self-stigma, which increased the negative impact of mental health service receipt while in foster care. After foster care exit, youth who identified experiencing self-stigma while in foster care tended to discontinue mental health services after foster care exit. In contrast, foster youth who did not identify self-stigma in the receipt of mental health services while in foster care continued accessing services upon foster care exit. Public stigma was not identified as influencing mental health service use post foster care, but was coupled with negative labels, stereotypes, and negative perceptions. Implications for preventive and intervention measures are also discussed/proposed.