TRAUMATIC EXPERIENCES AS THE PREDICTOR OF MALADAPTIVE OUTCOMES AMONG CHILDREN IN FOSTER CARE

Abstract

The aim behind this study was to first analyze the nature and the extent of childhood trauma and existing maladaptive outcomes (internalized and externalized problems, and dissociation) among adolescents in the foster system, and then analyze the possibility of using traumatic experiences to predict the aforementioned outcomes of childhood trauma. The sample consists of 121 respondents, children and youths in the care of child protective services, without adequate parental care, residing in temporary foster care families on the territory of Serbia, aged between 11 and 18. The respondents filled out the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire – CTQ (Bernstein & Fink, 2003), the Dissociative experience scale for adolescents, A-DES (Armstrong et al., 1997), and the Child behavior checklist – youth self-report (Achenbach & Rescorla, 2001). The results of the analyses have indicated that physical and emotional neglect are the most frequent forms of maltreatment in early childhood, with a relatively high prevalence of the other individual forms of trauma. Early childhood trauma statistically significantly predicted all the analyzed maladaptive outcomes, explaining approximately 20% of the variance of internalized and externalized problems, and dissociation. Recommendations are given for future studies.