“We felt completely left to ourselves.” Foster parents' views on placement disruption

The purpose of this paper is to explore the reasons for unintended placement disruptions in foster care. Based on a semistructured survey, the paper presents the views of 132 Norwegian foster parents who have experienced placement disruption between 2013 and 2015. Foster parents rated several relevant causes of placement disruption: the child's behaviour, the need for care, concern for the well‐being of their biological children, and lack of support from the Child Welfare Service (CWS). Although the child's behaviour was the cause most frequently reported in the quantitative data, CWS‐related factors such as poor collaboration, not being valued and listened to, insufficient support and follow‐up, and a mismatch between the child's needs and the foster carers' capacity were reported most frequently in the qualitative data. Placement disruption appears to be caused by the sum and interaction of several coexisting causes. It may not be the child's behaviour per se but rather the combination of challenging behaviour, concern for one's biological children, and insufficient support from CWS that lead to disruption. Good collaboration with the CWS in the form of respect, recognition, support, and follow‐up appears to be of the utmost importance in reducing the risk of placement disruption.     

A comparison of systems and outcomes for safeguarding children in Australia and Norway

Using aggregated national data, this paper compares outcomes of Australian ‘child protection’ (CP) and Norwegian ‘child welfare services’ (CWS). We highlight each nation's context and key elements of their CP/CWS organizations, with emphasis on policy and programme orientation. System outcomes are examined along with the implications of their different approaches. The main policy focus in Australia is protection and risk, while Norway's systemic approach stresses prevention, early intervention and support. These differences influence practitioner's intervention strategies and how the needs of children and parents are met. In Norway, approximately 80% of the children in the CWS receive some sort of supportive services. In contrast, Australian services for supporting families are narrowly targeted. Both countries share the ‘best interest of the child’ principle and an increased focus on children's rights, and have experienced increased service demands and rates of children in out‐of‐home care. The paper explores the relative merits of these systems.     

Placement breakdowns in long‐term foster care – a regional Swedish study

We used a regional sample of children in long‐term foster care to investigate the prevalence of placement breakdown in adolescence, and to assess risk factors/risk markers for placement disruption. The sample consisted of all 136 foster children in the region, born 1980–1992, who on their 12th birthday had been in the same foster family for at least 4 years. They were followed in case files until date of disruption or their 18th birthday. Data on conditions before and during placement were retrieved from case files, and analysed in bi‐ and multivariate models. Results showed that one in four placements broke down in adolescence. The median child who experienced a breakdown was 14 years old, and had been in the same foster home for more than 10 years. Prominent risk factors were (i) being placed after age 2 and (ii) having a birth sibling in the same foster home. We also uncovered strong risk markers that can be viewed as precursors of placement disruption. When the child or the foster parents repeatedly over time expressed dissatisfaction with the placement, this ended with a placement breakdown in 60% of cases. Implications for practice are discussed.     

Young people's perspectives of being parented in critical situations: teenage non‐offenders and desisters speak out

This paper considers young people's perspectives of being parented and draws on a study that comprised secondary analysis of 112 qualitative interviews with teenagers who had either never offended or who had ceased to offend for at least a year. Young people's offending behaviour has traditionally been linked to parenting styles, but it is parenting practices that proved central to parental responses to revelations about their offspring's offending. During the interviews, desisters gave accounts of their upbringing and, in particular, the parenting they experienced in one critical situation, namely when their offending came to light. At this point, parents of desisters were reported to be more punitive, more emotional and less measured than they were customarily, and non‐offenders anticipated similar reactions from their parents if they were to offend in the future. The relevance of the findings for professional interventions, especially parenting programmes, and for social workers in child protection is discussed, and suggestions for further research is made.     

THE RELATIONSHIP OF FAMILY BACKGROUND AND CASEWORK INVOLVEMENT TO PLACEMENT STABILITY

Stability of foster family placements is viewed as a function of the types of families foster children come from and the involvement of caseworkers in the children's cases. Two groups of children (N = 30) whose foster care histories differed in the number of placements they had experienced were compared. The identification of children prior to their first placement as "at risk" for instability in foster care is recommended, with the targeting of intensive casework activities on those children to follow as a means of lessening the likelihood of later placement changes.     

Emotional kinship care and neutral non‐kinship care — the struggle between discourses

In this paper, social workers' ideas of kinship care and non‐kinship care as foster placement alternatives for vulnerable children are analysed and discussed. The study is based on group interviews with Swedish social workers, using a discourse analytic approach. The interviews took two vignettes of children who needed an immediate and long‐term placement because one of the parents had killed the other parent, as their point of departure. Domestic violence is a common social problem across countries, and controversies about placement alternatives become even more apparent when discussing lethal violence. The analysis revealed three main discourses: ‘emotional kinship care’, ‘neutral non‐kinship care’ and ‘a real family’. The emotional kinship care discourse also revealed two competing sub‐discourses: ‘emotions as glue that binds’ and ‘emotions as obscuring a child perspective’, displaying a struggle concerning the advantages and risks that social workers connected to kinship care. In this paper, the results and their implications for vulnerable children are discussed.     

Breakdown of teenage placements in Danish out‐of‐home care

This study deals with the problem of breakdown in out‐of‐home placements for Danish teenagers. How often are these placements prematurely terminated against the requests and intentions of the child welfare authorities? Which factors seem to increase and decrease placement breakdown? The sample consists of 225 youths and 367 placements during the years 2004–2008. Among the 225 youths, 44% experienced a breakdown, and 33% of the 367 placements ended with a breakdown. A large proportion of the placement breakdowns (20%) occurred before 4 months, and within the first year, 62% of the placement breakdowns had taken place. Replacements took place in 61% of all placement breakdowns. The analysis showed that type of placement and number of youth at the same placement had significant association to placement breakdown, but variables based on the social worker's clinical assessment showed no association to breakdown. However, while the logistic regression model was significant, it explained only 6% of the variance. Earlier studies have indicated that breakdown is a substantial problem of child welfare in several other western countries, Denmark is no exception. These corresponding breakdown rates point out that no child welfare system yet have found a method to reduce breakdown substantially.     

Parents' perceptions of contact with the Norwegian Child Welfare Services

Listening to the opinions of service users is important in research. This study explored how parents cognitively and emotionally perceive contact with the Norwegian Child Welfare Services (CWS). It also compared the reports of parents recently referred to the CWS with reports of more experienced users. A content analysis was conducted on open‐ended survey responses from parents (n = 697). This study fills a gap in the literature on how parents perceive contact with the CWS and what they see as important factors when judging this contact. The findings showed that 40.6% of the parents reported exclusively positive experiences, 30.7% of the parents reported solely negative experiences, while 24% of the parents described both positive and negative experiences. The content of the positive and negative experiences were related to characteristics of the child welfare workers, the quality of the relationship, the help offered and the parent's feelings of insecurity and fear. New CWS users tended to view the contact as more positive than the more experienced ones. Practical implications are presented.     

Contact between birth parents and children in kinship care in a sample from Spain

Within the context of kinship care, the main objectives of this work are to study the characteristics of contact between foster children and their birth parents, and their relationship with key variables of fostering, the children and their kinship caregivers. The sample included 189 children from Spain and their kinship families. A semi‐structured placement interview and two scales relating to the child–caregiver relationship and child's psychological adjustment were used with the kinship families. The results revealed a significant percentage of foster children who had no family contact. Various visit types, frequencies and durations were described. Kinship care with contact, compared with placements without contact, was frequently characterized by the absence of professional supervision, and an affectionate child–caregiver relationship; moreover, children with contact were perceived to have fewer serious behaviour and socio‐emotional problems and a greater probability of family reunification. The regression analysis showed that the main predictors for how caregivers assessed contact were the children's emotional reaction during visits and the quality of the relationship between the kinship families and the birth parents. These results suggest the need for further research about contact, which will certainly have a major impact on professional intervention with these families.     

Predictors of outcome for unrelated adoptive placements made during middle childhood

This paper reports on a follow‐up to adolescence of two longitudinal prospective studies of children placed from public care with non‐related adoptive families in the UK. Factors associated with outcome are presented for 99 children (one index child per adoptive family) who were between 5 and 11 years of age at placement. Information concerning the children's backgrounds and care histories was obtained shortly after placement (T1), from social workers. Adopters were interviewed at T1 and again at the end of the first year (T2). A further follow‐up was conducted an average of six years after placement (T3). Outcomes at T3 were classified as either disrupted, which was true for 23%, continuing and ‘positive’ (49%) or continuing but ‘difficult’ (28%). Bivariate analyses revealed a number of attributes, related to both the child and the adoptive parents, which were associated with differential outcomes. Logistic regression produced five predictors of placement disruption: age at placement, behavioural problems, preferential rejection, time in care and the child's degree of attachment to the new mother. Differences were found between ‘positive’ and ‘difficult’ outcomes in continuing placements as well as between continuing and disrupted placements. The analysis suggests that adoption should certainly be considered as an option for children over 5 years of age while recognizing the need for both preparation and post‐placement support. Evidence of differential outcome in continuing placements provides support for efforts to reduce the number of placements and returns home that a child at risk experiences.     

Recognizing and addressing child neglect in affluent families

This paper explores how social workers intervene with affluent parents when there are child protection concerns about neglect. Based on data gathered from a small‐scale exploratory qualitative study with 30 practitioners from 12 local authorities across England, this study examined three overarching questions: (a) How do social workers identify risk factors for vulnerable children in affluent circumstances? (b) Which factors inhibit or enable social workers' engagement with resistant affluent parents when there are child protection concerns? (c) What kind of skills, knowledge, and experience is necessary for social workers to effectively assert their professional authority with affluent parents when there are concerns about abuse and neglect? The findings revealed that indicators of neglect can be difficult to identify and challenging to respond to when parents are affluent. Results indicate that social workers have to navigate complex power relationships with parents who are able to use their class privileges to resist their interventions. The paper concludes with a discussion of social workers' skills and capacities for engaging highly‐resistant affluent parents in the child protection system.     

Stability and change – a 7‐ to 8‐year follow‐up study of mental health problems in Norwegian children in long‐term out‐of‐home care

The aim of the study was to explore stability and change in mental health problems in Norwegian children aged 6–12 years old (n = 70) in long‐term out‐of‐home care. The children's mental health problems were assessed shortly after the placement and 7–8 years later by the caregivers and the teachers on the Revised Rutter Scales. Information on pre‐placement and placement factors were collected from the child welfare workers. At a group level the children's mental health problems had improved significantly over time according to the teachers' reports. According to the caregivers' reports, however, the children's problems were high and stable across time. Analyses aimed at detecting individual changes revealed a great variability in development according to both informants, indicating that treating the placed children as a homogenous group could be misleading. Several pre‐placement and placement variables were associated with the change in the children's mental health problems from the time of placement to the follow‐up time according to both informants' reports. However, all the predictors were accounted for by the strong effect of the children's problem scores when entering care.     

Social services provided for physically abused children in Sweden: background factors and interventions

This study aims at describing and analysing what kinds of social services are provided for physically abused children in Sweden. The social services files were examined for 113 children under 15 years of age (67 boys and 46 girls) who had been reported to the police as having been physically abused by a parent or equivalent caretaker in a particular police district. The children's social services files indicated an increased risk of a parental abusive behaviour prior to the abuse incident. There had been former interventions in 81 per cent of the families and previous reports on neglect or abuse in 44 per cent of the 113 families. After the abuse incident, investiga-tions were opened in 80 per cent of the cases. The three most common interventions were placement in foster care, referrals to Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Service and Social Services support contacts. The study shows that there was a tendency towards more proactive work with injured children, children of immigrant parents and children of mentally ill parents.     

Substance‐dependent women becoming mothers: breaking the cycle of adverse childhood experiences

Parenting may be particularly challenging for substance‐dependent mothers who have grown up with parents who themselves had substance use disorders (SUDs). The aim of this study was to explore how substance‐dependent mothers describe their childhood experiences with substance‐abusing parents and the association between these earlier experiences and their own role as caregivers. Using purposeful sampling, mothers admitted for 1 year to a family ward at a substance abuse clinic were approached. Through in‐depth, qualitative interviews, nine substance‐dependent mothers described their lives in the form of present, past and future tense. The findings indicate that substance‐dependent women, who have experienced SUDs in their families of origin, face several major challenges when they become mothers. Some describe having lived their whole lives ‘on the edge of society'. This makes their rehabilitation process more complex. All mothers work to abstain from substances, process traumatic experiences and integrate their family into society. They need help to build supportive social networks and to establish a safe and predictable family environment for themselves and their children. The therapeutic implications of these findings will be discussed.     

A Three‐factor Structure of Emotion Understanding in Third‐grade Children

Theoretical conceptualizations of emotion understanding generally imply a two‐factor structure comprised of recognition of emotional expressions and understanding emotion‐eliciting situations. We tested this structure in middle childhood and then explored the unique predictive value of various facets of emotion understanding in explaining children's socioemotional competence. Participants were 201 third‐grade children and their mothers. Children completed five different measures, which provided eight distinct indices of emotion understanding. Mothers completed two questionnaires assessing children's socioemotional skills and problems. Results indicated that: (a) emotion understanding in third‐grade children was differentiated into three unique factors: Prototypical Emotion Recognition, Prototypical Emotion Knowledge, and Advanced Emotion Understanding, (b) skills within factors were modestly related, (c) factors varied in complexity, supporting theoretical and empirical models detailing developmental sequencing of skills, and (d) skills in Prototypical Emotion Knowledge were uniquely related to mothers’ reports of third‐grade children's socioemotional competence. Implications regarding elementary‐school‐age children's social cognitive development are discussed.     

Searching for effective interventions for foster children under stress: a meta‐analysis

Foster children experience a lot of stress because of their life histories and changes in their family circumstances, such as foster care placement. It is important that foster parents recognize the early signs of stress in foster children and learn how to act in a non‐threatening and understanding manner. Family‐based interventions may help in this. In this paper, we report on a meta‐analysis of studies (n= 19) of the effectiveness of such interventions. All studies used a pre‐test/post‐test design. Both problem behaviour in foster children and the parenting skills of foster parents improved by 30%; however, none of the interventions were specifically intended to help young children (<4 years) to cope with stress. The importance of interventions for young foster children is discussed, as well as the necessary elements these interventions should include.     

How do placements in kinship care compare with those in non‐kin foster care: placement patterns,progress and outcomes?

As the use of kinship care is set to rise in England, it is important that policy and practice developments are based on firm evidence about kin placement outcomes and how these compare with those in stranger foster care. The research reported in this paper was based on case file reviews of 270 children, half in kin placements and half in stranger foster care, and on interviews with a sub-sample of 32 kin carers, social workers, children and parents. Kin carers were found to be significantly more disadvantaged than stranger foster carers: more kin carers were lone carers, with health problems, living in overcrowded conditions and had financial difficulties. The children, in contrast, were remarkably similar in the two kinds of placement. The main differences between the children in the two settings are examined in the paper. The children's progress and outcomes in terms of placement quality and disruption were very similar in the two settings, but kin placements lasted longer, mainly because fewer were planned as interim placements. However, because kin carers persisted with very challenging children and yet received fewer services than stranger foster carers, they were more often under strain. The implications for policy and practice are examined.     

Changing tides: Mothers’ supportive emotion socialization relates negatively to third‐grade children's social adjustment in school

Parents’ supportive reactions to children's negative emotions are thought to promote children's social adjustment. Research heretofore has implicitly assumed that such reactions are equally supportive of children's adjustment across ages. Recent findings challenge this assumption, suggesting that during middle childhood, socialization practices previously understood as supportive may in fact impede children's social adjustment. We explored this possibility in a sample of 203 third‐grade children and their mothers. Using structural equation modeling, we tested associations between mothers’ supportive (i.e., problem‐ and emotion‐focused) reactions to children's negative emotions and children's social skills and problems as reported by mothers and teachers. Mothers’ supportive reactions predicted greater social adjustment in children as reported by mothers. Inverse associations, however, were found with teachers’ reports of children's social adjustment: mothers’ supportive reactions predicted fewer socioemotional skills and more problem behaviors. These contrasting patterns suggest potential unperceived costs associated with mothers’ supportiveness of children's negative emotions for third‐grade children's social adjustment in school and highlight the importance of considering associations between socialization practices and children's various social contexts. The findings also highlight a need for greater consideration of what supportiveness means across different developmental periods.