Use Of Foster Care Research Articles

Impact Findings From a Randomized Controlled Trial of a Supportive Housing Demonstration Programme for Homeless, Child Welfare–Involved Families

ABSTRACTA “Housing First” approach to homelessness, showing promise for single adults, might also be effective for families whose homelessness combined with other challenges bring them to the attention of the child welfare system. This paper reports impact findings from the evaluation of a randomized, controlled trial in San Francisco that tested the effectiveness of an intervention designed to provide permanent housing and supportive services to such families, with the goal of safely reducing the use of foster care. Compared with families in the control group (33 families with 60 children), we found no significant impact on the likelihood of out‐of‐home placement up to 2 years after randomization. For families whose children were already in foster care, children in the treatment group (43 families with 63 children) reunified faster than those in the control group (42 families with 68 children), although nearly always before being housed. There was no difference between groups in time to case closure or likelihood of subsequent child welfare involvement. We discuss these findings in the context of important implementation challenges that have implications for further testing this intervention in tight housing markets.

Initial Evidence for the Reliability and Validity of New Survey Measures to Evaluate Family Outcomes of Kinship and Adoption Navigator Programs

Kinship navigator programs (KNPs) are an important strategy to prevent overreliance on the use of foster care, but the evidence for their effectiveness is still emergent. One of the challenges in building the evidence of KNPs is the lack of culturally responsive measures to assess program-specific outcomes. Four new measures were codesigned with advisors to the Ohio Kinship and Adoption Navigator Program, including service providers and caregivers with lived expertise, to assess the most proximal outcomes of the program: satisfaction with services, self-identified family needs, caregiver resourcefulness to meet children’s needs, and accessibility of community resources. Psychometric testing with 194 kinship caregivers and adoptive parents shows promising evidence for the measures’ reliability and validity. The findings have implications for navigator programs aiming to specify and measure proximal outcomes that are tailored to their program’s design.

The Effect of Family Foster Care vs. Residential Group Care on Educational Attainment

This study investigates the effect of foster care relative to residential group care on enrollment in upper secondary education among Danish children in out-of-home care who were placed out of home at the age six to 14 years (n = 4530). We address the proposition that children placed in family foster care generally have less severe emotional and/or behavioral problems than children placed in residential group care by utilizing a variation in the municipalities’ relative use of foster care among all children placed in out-of-home care. We find evidence that children living in municipalities with a high inclination to use foster care will be more likely to enroll in upper secondary education (p = 0.004). When splitting the sample by gender, we see that the effects are significant only among girls. When looking at potential mechanisms, we find that children in foster care are more likely to attend the school-leaving exams after lower secondary school, while we find no effect on the average standardized test score in the school-leaving exams. As with the main results, these findings apply to the girls only.

Examining the use of foster care during emerging adulthood in the United States

ABSTRACT This study describes U.S. emerging adults who entered foster care in 2019 using data from the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (AFCARS). Results showed that 2,763 (1.1%) of individuals who entered care were 18 or older. Eighty-five percent had been discharged from foster care in the past three years, most were either racialized as white (46.4%) or Black/African American (43.3%), 55.7% were female and 44.3% male, and over half had a clinically diagnosed disability. Implications include a need for improved data collection and research on emerging adults utilizing foster care to better understand and target services.

Association Between State Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Policies, Child Protective Services Involvement, and Foster Care in the US, 2004-2016

Public assistance policies may play a role in preventing child maltreatment by improving household resources among families of low incomes. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is one of the largest public assistance programs in the US. However, the association of state SNAP policy options to Child Protective Services (CPS) outcomes has not been rigorously examined. To model the association of state SNAP policies with changes in CPS and foster care outcomes in the US over time. This cohort study used panel data to examine the association between SNAP policy options and study outcomes from 2004 to 2016 for 50 US states and the District of Columbia in 2-way fixed-effects regression models. The count of SNAP policies was used as an instrument for SNAP caseloads in instrumental variables models. Data analysis was conducted in November 2021. The adoption of 1 or more state SNAP income generosity policies that improves or stabilizes household resources for SNAP participants. Reports of child maltreatment accepted for CPS investigation, children in substantiated reports, and children receiving foster care services for all forms of maltreatment, and specifically for child neglect per 100 000 child population. The mean (SD) number of SNAP income generosity policies increased from 1.47 (0.95) in 2004 to 2.37 (0.94) in 2010, to 2.49 (0.86) in 2016 across states; the median increased from 1 to 3 (range, 0-4) over the same period. A count of state income generosity policies was associated with large reductions in reports accepted for CPS investigation (-352.6 per 100 000 children; 95% CI, -557.1 to -148.2). Income generosity policy was associated with -94.8 (95% CI, -155.6 to -34.0) fewer substantiated reports and -77.0 (95% CI, -125.4 to -28.6) fewer reports substantiated for neglect per 100 000. Each additional income generosity policy adopted by a state was associated with -45.1 (95% CI, -71.6 to -18.5) to -42.3 (95% CI, -64.8 to -19.8) fewer total foster care placements per 100 000 children. State SNAP policies that improve and stabilize household resources appear to be associated with reductions in CPS involvement and use of foster care. The number of policies implemented had cumulative outcomes beyond individual policy outcomes.

Temporary Stays and Persistent Gains: The Causal Effects of Foster Care

Six percent of children in the United States enter foster care by age 18. We estimate the effects of foster care on children's outcomes by exploiting the quasi-random assignment of child welfare investigators in Michigan. We find that foster care improved children's safety and educational outcomes. Gains emerged after children exited the foster system when most were reunified with their birth parents, suggesting that improvements made by their parents were an important mechanism. These results indicate that safely reducing the use of foster care, a goal of recent federal legislation, requires more effective in-home, prevention-focused efforts. (JEL H75, I21, J13, K42)

Foster Care: How We Can, and Should, Do More for Maltreated Children.

Foster care provides round-the-clock substitute care for nearly 700,000 U.S. children who are temporarily or permanently separated from their family of origin each year. Each state manages its own foster care system according to federal regulations. Despite numerous large-scale federal policy reforms over the past several decades, substantial concerns remain about the experiences and outcomes of children in the foster care system. The most recent effort to reform foster care, the Family First Prevention Services Act of 2018, attempts to both reduce the use of foster care and increase the quality of care. In this report, we review how policy has shaped the experiences and outcomes of children in foster care, where policy has succeeded, and where it falls short of achieving its goals. We then identify opportunities for federal and state policy to better support the safety, health, and well-being of children in foster care.

Principles of foster care as the basics for the functioning of its system. Catalog, characteristics and meaning

The subject of investigation in this study has been made the principles of foster care with the necessary and concise presentation of the assumptions and solutions of foster care as such. The principles of foster care have been collected and described, which constitute a kind of catalog necessary to include in practice foster care to the fullest extent possible. These are the following principles: the welfare of the child and the family covered by foster care, subsidiarity of foster care, temporary foster care, priority of foster care over institutional care, the use of foster care on the basis of a court decision, hearing a child placed in foster care, placing a child in foster care as close as possible to his current place of residence, the right of a child in foster care to contacts with parents and other relatives, not separating siblings in foster care, not separating a minor mother in foster care and her child.

Temporary Stays and Persistent Gains: The Causal Effects of Foster Care

Six percent of children in the United States enter foster care by age 18. We estimate the effects of foster care on children’s outcomes by exploiting the quasi-random assignment of child welfare investigators in Michigan. We find that foster care improved children’s safety and educational outcomes. Gains emerged after children exited the foster system when most were reunified with their birth parents, suggesting that improvements made by their parents was an important mechanism. These results indicate that safely reducing the use of foster care, a goal of recent federal legislation, requires more effective in-home, prevention-focused efforts.

Changes in out of home care and permanence planning among young children in Scotland, 2003 to 2017

UK policy has increasingly promoted early intervention and permanence planning for children who experience, or are at risk of experiencing, abuse or neglect, raising the question of whether these practices have actually increased ‘on the ground.’ There is already evidence of growing early intervention in the form of out of home care, in England as well as Australia and Canada. However, we do not yet know whether this trend also exists in Scotland. Furthermore, there is no research investigating whether rates of permanence planning have changed anywhere in the UK or globally. The current study addressed these gaps through a comparison of two samples of children in Scotland: 110 children born in 2003 and 117 born in 2013, all of whom were placed under compulsory measures of supervision prior to three years of age. The 2013 cohort was significantly more likely than the 2003 cohort to be removed from their parents at birth, to reside away from parents throughout the first three years of life and to live apart from parents at three years of age. Significantly more of the 2013 cohort than the 2003 cohort had a plan for permanence by three years. These findings are consistent with the view that policy changes in the UK are affecting practice (although practice changes may have resulted from other sources as well/instead). The fall in parental care was largely compensated by an increase in the use of foster care, which has resource implications. Children removed from their parents at birth were usually not returned in the first three years of life, not raised by extended family members, and were separated from one or more siblings. This typically reduced instability for young children, but also entailed substantial birth family fragmentation. The impact on children and families of early removal into foster care must therefore be carefully assessed in light of the increasing prevalence of this practice in Scotland and elsewhere.

Foster care, recognition and transitions to adulthood for unaccompanied asylum seeking young people in England and Ireland

Policy in England and Ireland emphasizes the use of foster care for unaccompanied refugee minors (URM). Research has highlighted the predominantly positive experiences of young people in this form of care. Drawing on “recognition theory” (Honneth, 2012), this article examines the role of foster care in supporting URM transitions to adulthood. Young people are likely to have had traumatic and challenging experiences prior to their arrival in England and Ireland. They also face the challenge of settling into life in a new country, while often experiencing difficulties and stigma related to their identities as asylum seekers, but also as young people in care. Meanwhile, their transitions to adulthood are overshadowed by uncertainties about the future. Recognition theory identifies emotional, social, and legal recognition in human relationships as central to developing and maintaining people's well-being (Honneth, 2012; Warming, 2015). We argue that foster placements can provide the conditions necessary to support these three elements of recognition and, by doing so, can support transitions to adulthood. This argument is based on findings from two studies, in England (2012) and Ireland (2013), which explored experiences of URM in foster care.

Challenging the Overuse of Foster Care and Disrupting the Path to Delinquency and Prison

Foster care is supposed to be a temporary safe haven for abused and neglected children, a place where they are cared for while their parents solve the problems that led to their mistreatment. For many children, foster care undoubtedly serves this function well. However, thousands of children live in foster care for extended periods of time, many leaving care only when they become adults. Recent studies show that for many of these children, foster care is not a safe, nurturing place. Instead, being in care exposes these children to substantial risks of later juvenile delinquency and adult criminal arrest and conviction, as well as mental health problems, difficulties in school, poor employment prospects, poverty and homelessness. Ironically, reducing the use of foster care and focusing more on in-home services have been public policy goals in the United States for more than thirty years, and the roots of these policies go back more than a century. Despite this long consensus, the foster care system has been stubbornly resistant to change. I argue that the system persists because it allows society to assert that it is protecting children from harm while refusing to provide substantial material support to poor parents and that turning this analytical lens onto the actual functioning of the foster care system and its harmful effects on many children could provide new ways to argue for legal and policy reforms to the child welfare system that could reduce the unnecessary use of foster care and its consequences for delinquency.

Healing Families: Outcomes from a Family Drug Treatment Court

AbstractFamily drug treatment courts (FDTC) have been acknowledged as a promising intervention for substance‐abusing parents involved in the child welfare system. Over the past decade, the number of FDTC programs has grown substantially, yet questions remain regarding the efficacy of these courts. This study examines the ability of the Snohomish County (WA) FDTC to address the three main goals of the Adoption and Safe Families Act. Utilizing propensity score matching, this study found that participants were more likely to have their children returned, experienced stronger treatment completion rates, and had less use of foster care. Implications for replication and further analysis are discussed.

Notifications of parental alcohol/substance abuse and their handling by a child protection body in Iceland

The aims of this study were twofold: (1) to examine how high a proportion of the notifications to the Reykjavík Child Protection Committee (CPC) involved children that have been harmed because of their parents’ use of alcohol, illegal substances and pharmaceuticals and (2) to explore how the Reykjavík CPC responded to these families. The data, gathered from the Reykjavík CPC, consisted of notifications and journals during six months in 2010 and 2011. Thirty-one per cent of the notifications arose from substance abuse by parents. Neglect was the most common reason for notification, and almost half of those cases were alcohol or drug related. About half of the notifications came from police, health authorities and other public agencies, whereas close to half were referred to the CPC by relatives or neighbours. The CPC applied various measures to manage the needs of children whose parents abused alcohol or other substances, and the use of foster care was more common in cases involving parents abusing alcohol/drugs than in other CPC cases, indicating that the children had suffered severe harm.

Stress in shelter dogs and the use of foster care to improve animal welfare

Stress in shelter dogs and the use of foster care to improve animal welfare

Youth in foster care use drugs too: examining factors that influence foster parent willingness to foster substance-using youth

Youth in foster care use drugs too: examining factors that influence foster parent willingness to foster substance-using youth

Reactive Attachment Disorder in Adopted and Foster Care Children

A disruption in the initial attachment formed between an infant and a primary caregiver often leads to some type of disordered or disorganized attachment. While research has been conducted on the etiology, symptoms, and effective forms of therapy regarding this disorder, much definitive information remains unknown or unclear. With the increasing use of foster care in America and the frequency of adoption, it is becoming obvious that more attention is needed in the area of how to best appropriately approach a diagnosis of reactive attachment disorder. This article will discuss current trends and implications for mental health professionals working in the field of foster care and adoption settings.

Differences in Foster Care Utilization Among Non-Urban Counties

Previous research demonstrates that foster care utilization varies across different geographic areas and recent growth in use has occurred in non-urban areas. This article examines patterns of non-urban foster care utilization and the extent to which differences in utilization are related to person, situation, and place-specific characteristics. While some variability in utilization was related to social structural characteristics of counties, differences among counties in foster care use for adolescents and children with behavior problems accounted for higher rates of variability. The implications of these findings are discussed, as well as their relevance in developing strategies to promote appropriate use of foster care.

Creating “Well-Functioning” Residential Care and Defining Its Place in a System of Care

This article presents a model for understanding the elements and dynamics of a “well-functioning” residential group care resource based upon the study of 10 group care residences over a 14-month period. In addition, seven characteristics related to the differential use of foster care and residential care are presented. Finally, five key processes suggested as necessary for the creation of a system of care for young people are offered for consideration.

Placement Stability and Mental Health Costs for Children in Foster Care

Although prior population-based studies have found that children in foster care use more mental health services than their Medicaid peers, less is known about how different experiences in foster care impact the likelihood of mental health service use. The primary aim of this study is to test the hypothesis that instability of foster care placements is associated with higher costs for mental health care services. The secondary aim is to test the hypothesis that foster care children are also more likely to generate high costs for mental health services if they generate higher costs for non-mental health claims. Using administrative child welfare data linked to Medicaid claims, we assembled a unique retrospective cohort of adjudicated dependent children >2 years old who entered foster care between July 1993 and June 1995, spent at least 9 months in care, and were Medicaid eligible during a 1-year follow-up period. The primary outcome was high mental health service use, defined as having costs in the top decile of the sample. The primary independent variables were the number of foster care placements during the year and whether placements were interrupted by a return home for at least 1 month during that year (episodic foster care). We used logistic regression to estimate the association between placements and service utilization, with adjustment for age and physical health care costs. Of the 1635 children in the study, 41% had > or = 3 foster care placements, and 5% had episodic foster care during the year of observation. The top 10% of mental health service users accounted for 83% of the 2.4 million dollars in mental health costs. Both multiple placements and episodic foster care increased the predicted probability of high mental health service use. Higher physical health care costs also increased the probability of high mental health use for all children, but this increased probability was most dramatic among children with episodic foster care (probability of high mental health use: 0.78; 95% confidence interval: 0.42-0.94). Foster care placement instability was associated with increased mental health costs during the first year in foster care, particularly among children with increasing general health care costs. These findings highlight the importance of interventions that address the global health of children in foster care and may permit better targeting of health care resources to subgroups of children most likely to use services.