Foster parent perceptions of placement success
Introduction
Success in foster care has been described in various ways and from different perspectives. Studies have defined success from the viewpoints of child protection systems and caseworkers. And while researchers recognize the importance of foster parent and child perspectives, relatively few studies have represented them. While there are various indicators of success in foster care, there has been relatively little attention to the perspectives of foster parents about what constitutes success.
Section snippets
Literature review
The following review includes studies of successful fostering, based on the perspectives of child protection systems, foster children, and foster parents.
Method
Concept mapping is a quantitative approach to the analysis of qualitative data. Research participants provide responses to a question that each then groups together. The groupings are analyzed quantitatively and the result is a visual representation of the themes they co-construct. The role of the researchers in this process is to identify a question, record and distribute responses, determine the appropriate number of concepts, and assign descriptive labels to each.
Concept mapping has been
Results
Fig. 1 is the concept map of statements made by participants. The statements that make up each cluster are listed in Table 3.
Discussion
In this section we compare the study results to available literature.
Conclusion
There were many similarities between the literature on foster placement success and the results of our study. Both the literature and foster parents identified a range of stakeholders in foster placement outcomes, including birth families, foster children, their own families (children and extended members), as well as those that are system-wide and those of the caseworker. One conclusion that could be drawn from the literature and perspectives of foster parents is that there are many ways to
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge the financial support of this research through a grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. The authors also wish to thank Bev Wiebe of the Manitoba Foster Family Network and Brian Ridd of the Child Protection Branch, Manitoba Family Services and Housing for their support of this study. We would like to acknowledge the contributions of Meghan Sprung, Lee Anne Jarman, and Christine Miller for their research assistance. We would
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Perspectives of unaccompanied refugee children, their foster carers and guardians on placement success: Which factors predict multi-informant discrepancies?
2021, Children and Youth Services ReviewCitation Excerpt :Sinclair, Wilson, and Gibbs (2005, p. 7) mentioned that “… some foster placements clearly succeed: the foster children do well and are happy, they are loved in a way which does not threaten their relationships with their families, their behaviour improves, they get glowing reports from school …”, whereas “… other placements just as clearly fail: behaviour gets worse, the child truants from school, the carer asks for the child to be removed”. A good match between a child and a foster family might contribute to placement success (Brown & Campbell, 2007; Doelling & Johnson, 1990; Sinclair et al., 2005). Child characteristics and foster carer characteristics are also significant (Brown, 2008; Geiger, Piel, Lietz, & Julien-Chinn, 2016; Miller, Randle, & Dolnicar, 2019; Oke, Rostill-Brookes, & Larkin, 2013; Randle, 2013; Sinclair & Wilson, 2003).
The relationship between well-being and meaning-making in kinship caregivers
2020, Children and Youth Services ReviewCitation Excerpt :The positive effects included intrinsic rewards, feelings of doing well for their family and the children, and love generated between caregivers and foster children (Broady, Stoyles, McMullan, Caputi, & Crittenden, 2010; Buehler Cox, & Cuddeback., 2003; MacGregor, Rodgers, Cummings, & Lescheid, 2006; Rosenwald & Bronstein, 2008). These positive effects were noted to generalize to the entire family as well (Brown & Campbell, 2007; MacGregor et al., 2006; Samrai, Beinhart, & Harper, 2011). Negative effects were described as reductions in physical and psychological health related to encountering difficult behaviors of foster children, transitions in care, and other stressors related to foster parenting (Broady et al., 2010; Buehler et al., 2003; Rosenwald & Bronstein, 2008).
Foster parent self-care: A conceptual model
2019, Children and Youth Services ReviewConceptualizing effective legal representation for Foster youth: A group concept mapping study
2018, Children and Youth Services ReviewFoster home integration as a temporal indicator of relational well-being
2017, Children and Youth Services ReviewCitation Excerpt :The available research on relational well-being for youth in foster care suggest inclusive family processes are important to youths successful adjustment and adaptation (Affronti et al., 2015; Semanchin-Jones et al., 2016), and restrictive rules and policies can hamper developmental opportunities for older youth (Rauktis et al., 2011). Foster family relationships can serve as an important source of support as youth transition into adulthood (Geenen & Powers, 2007), and youth's successful adjustment and integration into a foster family may promote the stability of their placement (Brown & Campbell, 2007; Leathers, 2006). The presence of siblings and/or kin in the same home may be particularly protective to youth, promoting placement stability and relational well-being (Herrick & Piccus, 2005; Waid, 2014; Waid et al., 2016).
Foster care placement change: The role of family dynamics and household composition
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