Adoption & Fostering

The importance of inclusivity and representation is increasingly recognised in fostering services and within research to ensure that services are meeting the needs of all the diverse communities they aim to support. However, the extent to which research with foster carers is inclusive in its participant recruitment is not clear. A scoping review was conducted to explore the characteristics of foster carers who take part in research, how these characteristics are reported and the methods used by researchers to promote inclusivity and diversity in their recruitment. Across the 82 journal articles included, the review found substantial variation in how studies report the characteristics of participants, and some characteristics such as disability and religion are absent across the literature. Notwithstanding the inconsistencies in reporting, the review found that some communities of carers are underrepresented within research compared with national levels, including kinship foster carers and non-White carers. There is also a lack of discussion about inclusivity and participant representation within research papers, indicating that although there is broader recognition of the need for inclusive and representative research in health and social care, there is substantial room for improvement within research with foster carers.

In fostering services and in research, being inclusive and making sure that carers of all kinds are fully represented is important. This is to make sure that services can support all communities in a way that meets their unique needs and experiences. However, currently, it is not clear how inclusive research with foster carers is. This paper is a review of published studies which gives a broad overview of the characteristics of foster carers who take part in research, how these characteristics are reported and how researchers talk about their efforts to be inclusive when recruiting participants to their studies. Eighty-two journal articles were included in the review. There was lots of variation in how the studies reported the characteristics of participants, and some characteristics such as disability and religion were very rarely mentioned. Even with this variation in reporting, overall, there are some communities of carers who are underrepresented within research, compared with national levels. These include kinship foster carers and non-White carers. The literature reviewed generally had very little discussion about how to increase inclusivity or representation of the people who got involved in research about fostering. This suggests that while inclusive and representative research is seen as important, there is lots of room for improvement within research with foster carers.

England has seen a progressive decline in the number of approved fostering households, whereas the number of children needing foster homes has increased. To address these disparities, this research explored whether an inclusive approach is taken to encourage Disabled people to become foster carers. The two-year co-produced project was part of the Disability Research on Independent Living and Learning (DRILL) initiative, funded by the National Lottery Community Fund. Led by the University of Worcester, the authors worked with four fostering organisations. The methodology comprised an online survey to gauge the level of disability awareness in these organisations, followed up by a customised training session for each site. Findings from the training days and a further workforce survey indicated that fostering social workers recognised that disability and foster care were not mutually exclusive, and that Disabled people could provide a valuable part of the workforce, although they were not routinely recruited. For Disabled people to be afforded equal opportunity as foster carers, it was acknowledged that non-discriminatory practice must become standard practice, necessitating significant changes at both institutional and professional practice levels.

There is a great need for more foster carers in the UK. The lack of foster carers means that children who need foster homes have less choice about where they might live, often meaning they are not fostered near to their families and schools. In recent years, foster care organisations have recruited more and more foster carers from ethnic minorities, single foster carers and non-heterosexual foster carers. However, Disabled people do not seem to have been reached out to as potential foster carers. This research study set out to explore why Disabled people have not been recruited, especially as many would be likely to have the types of skills that fostering requires.

The research study was designed and carried out by academics and Disabled people. Surveys, training events and interviews were all used to try to get a wide range of views from staff and Disabled people about the lack of Disabled people who are foster carers. Four fostering organisations volunteered to take part in the study, although one dropped out part way through when a new manager did not think the project worthwhile. A small number of Disabled people who had become foster carers were also interviewed, as were several who had not been assessed or had been turned down during the assessment process. The Disabled foster carers were able to give examples of successful fostering careers, and staff also gave examples of how their Disabled foster carers were equally as effective as non-Disabled foster carers. The research uncovered discrimination in recruitment processes, a lack of Disabled foster carers being featured on websites, and an absence of knowledge or training among fostering staff about the Equality Act 2010 and its requirement for ‘reasonable adjustments’ to be made to accommodate Disabled people. Key recommendations were for staff training on disability, reasonable adjustments in assessment processes and that Disabled foster carers should be championed.

Parents with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDDs) are at an increased risk of having their children placed in foster care. A group intervention to provide support was developed in Australia and applied in Sweden to help mothers with children in foster care deal with the grief of having a child removed and their new parenting role. An evaluation found that the intervention could contribute to maturing and developing the insights and skills of the mothers. This study aimed to explore the long-term process and outcomes of the intervention in terms of the mothering role, visits with their children and the need for support. An explorative and qualitative single-case design was used. Three mothers with IDDs were interviewed before participating in the intervention, directly after the intervention and between nine and 14 months later. Interviews were analysed with qualitative content analysis. The intervention helped the mothers to come to a broader and shared experience with new insights and acceptance of help, improved contact with social services and better strategies in their relationships with their children. The feelings of grief and loss lasted over time. The study concluded that despite the history of mothers with IDDs whose children are in care (e.g., life crises, the trauma of placement), an intervention adapted to meet their needs can contribute to long-lasting experiences of wellbeing and reconciliation, which also benefit their children.

This study looked at how a special support programme helped mothers with disabilities whose children were taken into foster care. The programme aimed to help these mothers cope emotionally and adjust to their new parenting role. Researchers talked to three mothers with disabilities before, immediately after and about one year after they joined the programme. They wanted to see how helpful the programme was in the long run, focusing on how the mothers felt about being parents with children in foster care, how they experienced collaboration with social services and foster homes around visits and their need for support.

The study found that the programme was helpful. It made the mothers feel less alone and more willing to get help and work with social services. They also learned better ways to parent during visits. But even after the programme, the mothers still felt sad about not having their children with them.

This research suggests that programmes tailored like this can help mothers with disabilities feel better and be better parents. This means it’s important for social services to offer such support programmes. They can make a big difference in the lives of mothers with disabilities, helping them to feel happier and more confident as parents.

Children who have experienced trauma require emotionally responsive parenting to support them to make sense of their early stories and build healthy relationships. Foster care can be an important resource for these children, but the task can be challenging. This study uses Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis to explore the lived experiences of foster carers in holding the stories of trauma and loss brought by the children in their care. Ten local authority foster carers were interviewed, all caring for children aged between eight and 13 years and placed with them on a long-term basis. Three superordinate themes were identified from the analysis: (1) Processing the story; (2) Holding different stories; and (3) The personal and professional. ‘Processing the story’ highlighted the emotional task engaged in as carers tried to make sense of and process their child’s story, for themselves and their child. ‘Holding different stories’ captured the different ways in which the foster carer and the child’s story interacted. ‘The personal and professional’ explored the challenge of managing the personal task of care within the wider professional context, and the relationships carers held with the professional team around them. The importance of acknowledging the considerable emotional task of caring for children who have experienced trauma was identified.

Children in foster care have often experienced a history of trauma, loss and neglect. They often have complex emotional needs and require skilled and sensitive parenting. Foster care can be a valuable resource for these children. However caring for children who have experienced trauma is an emotionally demanding task.

This study aimed to better understand the experiences of foster carers who are caring for children who have experienced trauma and loss. Ten local authority foster carers were interviewed. All 10 carers were caring for children between the ages of eight and 13 years old. The children were all placed with the foster carers on a long-term basis. The researcher used semi-structured interviews and analysed the data using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis.

The research findings highlight the difficult emotional task that foster carers undertake. They show the emotional demands involved in caring for children who have experienced trauma and loss. They demonstrate the challenges involved in working with the child’s wider family. They show the difficulties foster carers experience in having to balance their role as carers with their role as professionals, and the challenges involved in working with other professionals around the child. The research underlines the importance of understanding the complexity of the fostering task and the importance of providing appropriate support to help foster carers fulfil their role.

Research shows that outsourcing family foster care through independent foster care agencies (IFAs) has become common in several countries, such as the UK and Sweden. In Sweden, a majority of local authorities use IFAs. However, knowledge is limited regarding the experiences of professionals who use these services. Social workers, managers and administrative support staff in five public child welfare authorities were interviewed, and their attitudes towards using IFAs and the rationale for their use were thematically analysed. In short, three main themes were identified: (1) A reluctance towards IFA use due to quality, cost and contracting concerns; (2) Use of IFAs due to in-house organisational failures and the availability of IFAs; and (3) Finding competence and resources. The findings indicate that social work professionals tend to prefer in-house foster care and are reluctant to use IFAs as their use is complicated by market regulations and ‘information asymmetry’. However, as previously shown, IFAs may resolve recruitment issues and in some cases also provide the competence and resources needed in complex cases. This article discusses these findings in relation to the concepts of New Public Management and analyses the foster care market as a quasi-market.

It has become common in several countries to use companies or non-profit organisations to recruit and support foster carers, so it is necessary to understand why and how those working within foster carer services experience this process. Social workers, their managers and other staff working with foster care within five different local authorities were interviewed. The interviews were written out. The researcher read the transcriptions several times and looked for commonalities and differences in statements related to the research questions. These were marked and then ordered into smaller codes, which were in turn sorted into more general themes. Those interviewed were often reluctant to use companies and non-profits to recruit and support foster carers because they could not be sure that they would deliver a good service, and they thought it was expensive and complicated to organise. Participants also often believed the use of companies and non-profit organisations for these purposes was caused by problems within their own organisations and that the companies and non-profits could sometimes provide services and foster carers that their own organisation could not. In some cases, the participants thought the use of the companies or non-profits was a positive way of finding the right competence and resources for children in care. The social work professionals included in this study appeared to prefer to find and support foster carers themselves and to avoid turning to companies and non-profits in most cases because of the problems with quality and costs they experienced. Still, many have found it useful or necessary to use them to solve problems with recruiting foster carers and to provide extra support for children or foster carers in some cases.

Foster care children are at a higher risk of experiencing social or health problems in their lives (Sariaslan et al., 2022). Nevertheless, some youth show high adaptiveness when engaged in work, schooling and forming family relationships (Jones, 2011). The present study focuses on agency in the developmental paths of 18 young adults (14 females, four males, aged 18–32 years old) with family foster care backgrounds. Four main narratives emerged from analyses of individual interviews with these participants: (1) Relational agency; (2) Restricted agency; (3) Accommodated agency; and (4) Independent agency. The young people’s narratives involved affordances and constraints with respect to the manifestation and development of agency at different phases of their lives. This study is part of a larger project that examines factors contributing to the resilience of these young people; family foster care is the most common form of care in Finland, but there is scant literature highlighting the experiences of the young people affected. The findings can help both those working within care to understand the factors that facilitate resilience and the young people themselves to reflect on the potential to influence their lives. The findings can deepen our understanding of the support that fostered youth need to cope with their early experiences and to develop their own agency.

The present study focuses on agency in the developmental paths of 18 young adults (14 females, four males, aged 18–32 years old) with a family foster care background. Four main narratives emerged from analyses of individual interviews with this group: (1) Relational agency; (2) Restricted agency; (3) Accommodated agency; and (4) Independent agency. The young people’s narratives involved affordances and constraints with respect to the manifestation and development of agency at different phases of their lives. The study is part of a larger project examining the factors that contribute to the resilience of young people affected by family foster care – the most common form of care in Finland. Foster care children are at a higher risk of social or health problems in their lives (Sariaslan et al., 2022). Nevertheless, some young people show high adaptiveness when engaged in work, schooling and forming family relationships (Jones, 2011). The findings of this article can help people working within foster care to understand the factors that facilitate resilience and the young people themselves to reflect on the influence they can have in their own lives. The findings can deepen an understanding of the support foster youth need to cope with their experiences and to develop agency.