Prevention of Instability in Foster Care: A Case File Review Study
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Prevention of Instability in Foster Care: A Case File Review Study Carolien Konijn1 · Cristina Colonnesi2,5 · Leoniek Kroneman3 · Ramón J. L. Lindauer4 · Geert‑Jan J. M. Stams2 Accepted: 10 October 2020 © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract Background Stability in foster care is paramount, since it enables children with a history of maltreatment to experience secure attachment relationships, and decreases the risk for behavioral and emotional problems when growing up. Objective We investigated whether foster care interventions play a role in enhancing foster placement stability, in addition to several characteristics of foster children and foster families. Our hypothesis was that foster children of female gender, relatively young at start of the placement, with less previous foster care placements, staying in kinship care, placed with siblings (if they had any) and in a foster family receiving a training to enhance the foster parents’ knowledge on childhood trauma, an attachment-based video-interaction intervention or Treatment Foster Care, would experience significantly less breakdown in foster care. Method A multilevel analysis was conducted on data from 2000 foster care placements in a 4 year period (2015–2018), concerning 1316 foster families (35.9% kin) and 1542 foster children (49.4% boys, M age = 7.54 years). Results The frequency of previous foster care placements (OR = 3.56) increased the risk for breakdown, and receiving the Basic Trust intervention (OR = 0.26) or Treatment Foster Care (OR = 0.11) decreased that risk. Other investigated variables were unrelated to breakdown when checked for the number of foster placements and the applied interventions. Conclusions Foster care organizations should systematically monitor important risk factors for breakdown, in order to (timely) intervene if necessary to enhance the chances for continuity of foster care placements. Treatment seems to make a difference. Keywords Foster care · Multilevel analysis · Breakdown · Instability · Basic Trust · Treatment Foster Care · Trauma-informed parenting
* Carolien Konijn [email protected] Extended author information available on the last page of the article
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Vol.:(0123456789)
Child & Youth Care Forum
Introduction Most out-of-home placed children stay in foster care. In the United States, 77% of about 437.000 out-of-home placed children (AFCARS Report 2019), in England 73% of approximately 54.000 looked-after children (Department of Education 2019) and in the Netherlands 51% of almost 43.000 out-of-home placed children (CBS 2020) live in foster families. The experiences of children placed in foster care are more positive than of children in residential care (Li et al. 2019). Main reasons why children cannot grow up with their parents are inadequate parenting, such as abusive and neglectful parental behavior, often combined with parental psychopathology, delinquency and/or substance abuse (McDonald and Brook 2009; Okma-Rayzner 2006; Shaw et al. 2015). Foster children
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