Young people’s experience of long-term

foster care

Nordisk barnevernskongress August 28 – 31 2003, Reykjavík.

An interview study 2001 – 2003Guðrún Kristinsdóttir

Iceland University of Education

This project is initiated and funded byThe Government Agency for Child Protection, Iceland

[Barnaverndarstofa Íslands]

Young people’s experience of long-term foster care

• Outline:

• On the study - young people were interviewed

• Participants, the foster homes, biological parents.

• Stories in the stories; themes of the narratives

• Life today - examples and overall outcome

• Conclusions

Theoretical inspiration

• Nordic foster care and child-centred research: • Guldborg et al.,1991, Denmark; Koch och Koch 1995,

Norway; Törrönen, 1994, Finland; Jónsdóttir, 1993, Iceland; Andersson 1995, 1998, Börjeson & Håkansson, 1990, Sweden;

• UK foster care research: and methodology development: Berridge, 1998, Hill (1997), Thomas & O´Kane,(1998), Thomas (2000). Butler & Williamson, 1994, Thomas, et al. (1999).

• Childhood of sociology studies – methodology- James & Prout, (1990) Qvortrup (1991).

• Methodological Silverman (1993, 2001), Pole et al. (1999).

Perspectives • Being a foster child is often a fraught experience, • however, some children are resilient. • Foster care is difficult to carry out successfully. • Participatory research among children and young

people has concluded that:• Children and young people are active subjects;

capable of forming judgements and making decisions at an early age; suitable methods applied, they are no less trustworthy in their accounts than adults.

Findings relevant to this study suggest that children in care

• wish to have an influence in own lives; • wish to have a warm and stable relationship with

at least one other person and• to experience honesty and trustworthiness from

practitioners and carers, • According to voices of children and young

people in the Nordic studies (and even some other), this is often absent in practice.

Main objectives

• To study the participants’ experience from their own perceptions.

• Look for implications for practice.• Try out methods of participatory research• A qualitative study of 16 cases, no comparison

with general population.• This is a first presentation on selected items

from the study - focused on analysis of empirical findings, account on methodological issues will be limited.

Guidelines not only for child welfare practice

The quality demands mentioned above - such as openness, trustworthiness and acknowledging influence of the intervieweed should also be considered in research on sensitive topics.

(Oakley, 1981, Hollway and Jefferson, 2000)(picture from Roberts, ed. 1981)

• What is success in long-termfoster care?

In study of lived experience of a foster child following criteria apply

• The foster child who fares well:

• describes good conditions of up-bringing,

• has experienced to be cared for,

• has established mutual trust and relationship/s to significant other/s,

• has kept contact with family of origin and

• established peer relationships.

• This child experiences a feeling of autonomy and

copes with daily life to the extent most people do.

( Berridge 1998).

Sample

• Drawn from register of the Agency for Child pretection

• Aimed at maximum variation regarding the intended age span, gender, area of residence and types of long-term foster care (with consent or not, i.e. kinship or not).

• Randomly drawn given these conditions

Participants

• 20 persons age 17 – 29 years consented to participate.

• At the time of interviews 4 could not been reached; were hampered by ongoing problems or did not show.

• 16 young persons were interviewed

• 11 women and 5 men.

Guiding concepts in semi-structured interviews:

• Care

• Conditions

• Relationships

• Autonomy

Themes for the interviews

• the period prior to foster care,• the period in care, reasons for care, daily

conditions, health, relationships with siblings and friends, schooling,

• contact with original family, • your life of today,• your evaluation of being put into care, • your recommendations to practitioners

and the child welfare system.

To the findings

Time prior to care

• Most of the children had been in a residential home for children (vistheimili).

• Prior to that most of them had stayed with their parents.

• Five children were placed in kinship care, two of them had parents who died and they were both placed in own homes of siblings, both who were around 20 years of age.

Age and duration of foster care

Age at time of placement• Range: 1 -13 years• ≤ 4 years: 11 children• ≥ 5 years 5 children • Mean for Iceland (2002): 4 years.

----------------------------------------------------------Time in foster care: • Range: 3 – 16 years• Mean (approx.): 12.3 years

Biological family

• Most biological parents belonged to the working class.

• Several families of origin were big. • Common reasons of interventions were

psychiatric disorders or alcohol and drug-related problems of parents.

• Mothers to 7 participants and 1 biological father were deceased at the time of the interviews.

• The young people did not know anything about 4 biological fathers and 3 biological mothers.

The foster homes

• Most foster carers belonged to the middle class. Most of the cares seem to have lived in stable conditions, we will turn back to exceptions from this.

• Some siblings were placed together, some of them had brothers and sisters who were placed in other homes.

• Six children were adopted, commonly at the age of 12-13.

Was it right to place you in foster care?

Luck or dissatisfaction• The majority of the interviewed was satisfied with being

placed in foster care.• Luck was the word many of them used. One said:

• I had been in far worse situation without the care, security and healthy conditions I got there.

Consistent with other findings..• Five were dissatisfied for different reasons; suffering

from feelings of rejection and jealousy, missing mother, being abused, behaviour problems in adolescence feeling badly treated by the authorities.

Some things they could have done differently

• Be together with my sisters and brothers• Being consulted• Matching child and foster home better • Evaluated my case when things went wrong• Arranged for me to see my Dad• Arranged so we siblings could meet• Generally provided psychological support and in crisis; to

meet a psychologist who was a real help• Intervene earlier in a child’s life.• Not limit parental contact to early years.

Several themes to consider

• Experiences of parental contact and visiting • Kinship care - differences• When it went wrong, what went wrong?• Development and changes during adolescence • Feelings towards original parents• Loyalty towards the foster parents• Revealing emotions: No, I didn’t feel like telling

them

stories different in several ways

• My life is quite normal. That life as a foster child is normal is an important message in some of the narratives.

• Others do not feel so good emotionally.

• Yet others are more or less in trouble.

Re-shaping of a sort of “original” family

• A shift in the narratives between stressing normality and telling about unresolved questions or various aspects of being in a special situation.

• Re-connecting with family of origin which leads to:

• Travels into new spheres of private life which often relate to yet one more theme:My sisters and brothers –

• An ongoing re-positioning in adult life.

the “story” in the story floating arenas...

The family of today

The biological family

The imaginary family

How is life today?

• Half of the interviewed lives with their foster carers and the other half has formed their own family; however, 1 is homeless.

Conditions of today:

• The interviewed were divided into three groups based on the criteria mentioned earlier.

• The resilient (7) The insecure (4) The

rootless (5)

• Let us look at different examples (fictional names)

Díana, 22, rootless; her parents died, her sister became her foster carer

• Of course it was awfully sweet of them to take me, BUT my sister is such a closed person, I never got any contact with her. It was in fact easier to talk to her husband.

• Why didn’t anybody ask me? I was much closer to my brother. Also my auntie wanted to have me.

• if you are dissatisfied /…/ the care does not work.• Díana is homeless, unemployed, uses drugs, she and

her boy friend who is in trouble live temporarily at a friends place at the time of the interview.

Rúna, 23 : is rather rootless;her family of origin was dissolved;

• Rúna came in kinship care 4 -5 years old, she was sexually abused by her foster father, she had several disruptions of care and was placed in residential care. She finally moved to her biological mother, which was, according to Rúna, an act of misfortune.

• I´ve had so many social workers ! /.../ They are still controlling me, the social services.

• Rúna lives together with her two children, their father died recently. She has a new boy friend. She is about to decide very soon if she begins to work or study.

• BUT: Things just tend to repeat in my life...

Sigurður, 25, is insecure:I often had bad feelings about my mother

• Why did it have to be like this?• Why ME? Why don’t I get any answers WHY?• How had it been if I had stayed?• I often thought: My mother is poor, would I always

wear the same clothes and have a bad haircut? • Sigurður still lives with his foster carers, he works,

has a girl friend and a car, he gets anziety attacks and receives drug treatment because of this.

Ásgeir, 19, is resilient:

• I understand that I went into care, my parents were SO young.

• I am content.• They (carers) took good care of me.• I have good grades and my high school is

considered to be very good.• My mother has always been very keen

that I study.• Well, I have not had many friends... X

Ása Dögg, 28, is resilient: My mother was very sick and my father was a bit strange;

in fact they both were...• Was in foster care from 1 years old, together with

her brother. Positive conditions during childhood.

• I´m lucky compared to my sisters and brothers who were elsewhere.....(!)

• Ása Dögg lives in her own home together with her husband and child, she works at an office, she has decided to continue studies in the coming autumn.

• Now: the backbone of the family...

Returning to the key concepts

• Care

• Conditions

• Relationships

• Autonomy

resilient, insecure, rootless

1.The resilient: secure conditions in childhood and stable relationships with their foster parents. Several experienced difficulties in school due to their background, but had also supporters and friends. They are working or studying and of good health. Some describe themselves as being troubled by conflicts or negative emotions due to their background.

2: The insecure: Good care och positive upbringing, have jobs or study. Have had and still struggle with emotional problems, three of them received treatment for this when interviewed, in periods difficulties to control use of alcohol and drugs.

3. The rootless: None of them seems to have been rooted in the foster

home. Two are working at the time of the interviews. Heterogeneous group. Disrupted placements, emotional and psychic/psychiatric problems, violent behaviour. Four have abused drugs.

Overall outcome: Considerable variety in the individual foster care stories.

• Care provided for most of the interviewed security and healthy conditions. Reasons for placement all reflect disempowered biological parents.

• The majority did well or fairly well and is satisfied with the placement and lives now stable lives.

• Some struggle with insecurity and instability; which

hampers them in daily life, even here most of them mention good support from their carers.

• The interviewed underline importance of family of origin; not the least siblings relationships.

Overall outcome contd.

• Individuals with negative experiences point out failings by the authorities. They ask for psychological support and to be consulted.

• Services seems to have been distant for them in childhood except for a few persons, where the interviewed did not feel real help. An exception involving 2 children is found from this.

• Inconsistent with increased emphasis on participator practices and UN Child Convention.

• Considered should be that the study is in retrospect.

THEY DID A GOOD JOB

• Those who selected the good foster carers should be commended.

• Together most of the children and foster carers did a good job considering background, life in childhood and their life today.