Abstract
Adopted children tend to have high levels of emotional, behavioural and developmental need and are more likely to present to a range of services, including Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS). Although research exploring adopted children's perspectives is growing, it remains limited. Furthermore, there has been little work to engage adopted children in research. Our project aimed to examine adopted children's viewpoints of mental health and services alongside those of their adoptive carers. Results indicated that although there were some similarities between carer and child perspectives, they also frequently differed. They provided different constructions of the problem but agreed that family relationships were strained. Some acknowledgement of the role of the school was offered and other external sources of support cited. Coping was considered to be complex and while some issues were analogous to ‘normal’ family life, much was inherent to the adoption status.
Highlights
The ‘psychological integration’ of the adopted child into their new family, which is indicated by rewarding relationships between the child and, mutual feelings of family belonging and a subjective sense of permanence, is a strong predictor of positive outcomes (Neil, 2012)
UK policy promotes adoption as the best route to a stable family life for children unable to return to their birth families (Selwyn et al, 2006)
Adopted children tend to have complex behavioural, emotional and developmental needs (Marinus et al, 2006), it is no surprise that they are more likely to experience a higher extent of mental health difficulties and to require more service input than their non-adopted peers (Grotevant, 1997; Hussey et al, 2012)
Summary
The ‘psychological integration’ of the adopted child into their new family, which is indicated by rewarding relationships between the child and, mutual feelings of family belonging and a subjective sense of permanence, is a strong predictor of positive outcomes (Neil, 2012). UK policy promotes adoption as the best route to a stable family life for children unable to return to their birth families (Selwyn et al, 2006). The broad range of these needs is often related to children’s past traumatic experiences, their attachment relations (Department of Education, 2013). Such experiences frequently underpin families’ requests for help and their care pathways to services. This is often because the theory of attachment appeals to caregivers, and despite notwithstanding the critical views of attachment theory, it can play a useful role to some extent in this context (Barth et al, 2005). The exact reasons can, be difficult to define at the help-seeking stage, and may relate to the child’s development, social functioning, behaviours at school or home, family relationships, and their emotional well-being; often a combination of several of these factors and contexts
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