Paper
Sharing the care? Birth parents’ perception of foster care placements
- issue: Issue 3 / 2009
- authors: Ingrid Höjer
- keywords: foster carers, foster children, birth parents
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- downloaded: 1
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abstract
Background
Research shows that parents with children in care are often marginalised in different ways. A majority are single mothers with a weak social network and an unstable social and economic situation. Poverty and exclusion from the labour market constitute elevated risk factors for children to be placed in care, which is clearly displayed by the following results from Swedish research: If the mother lived with a partner, had some kind of university degree, was employed and not dependent on economic support from the Social Services, one child out of 2,000 were placed in care before the age of seven. If the mother was single, with only nine years in school, unemployed and dependent on economic support from the Social Services, one child out of seven were placed in care before its seventh birthday (Social Rapport 2006). The research results presented above reveal a class perspective - a majority of parents with children in care are poor, unemployed and dependent on social benefits. To sum up, the combination of social and economical problems leaves this group in a vulnerable and disadvantaged situation, where it may be hard to provide good parenting.
In Sweden, about 20,000 children were placed in out-of-home care some time in 2006. Little is known of how their birth parents perceive their situation.
Purpose
The results in this paper are drawn from focus groups interviews with parents, whose children were placed, or had previously been placed, in foster care. The focus group interviews were performed in April 2006 at the conference centre Sätra Bruk, which is owned by the Swedish foundation Allmänna Barnhuset. The purpose of the paper is to account for parent's experiences of their contact and collaboration with foster carers - how the parents perceived the 'sharing of care' - and to analyse their position as parents with children in care.
The focus groups consisted of 13 parents (12 mothers and one father), three social workers, three members of the Allmänna Barnhuset staff, and the researcher. The youngest of the parent was in her early twenties, and the oldest about 50 years old. No records were taken of parents, they only introduced themselves by their name. The parents had different experiences of having their children placed in foster care, and using the services provided by the Child Welfare Services. Some parents had had their children placed in care over many years, others only a couple of years. Some of the children had stayed in the same foster home, while others had changed foster families several times. Semi-structured interview guides were used in all groups. All sessions were recorded and later transcribed.
The knowledge of how biological parents experience the contact with social services and foster carers while their children are placed in foster care, is limited (Kapp and Propp 2002, Alpert 2005). The purpose of the focus group was to gather information of the parent's experiences of having their children placed in care and collaboration with social services and foster carers.
Key findings
Most parents experienced feelings of inferiority, guilt and shame. The parents' relationship with foster carers was often asymmetric: parents felt their position to be inferior to that of foster carers. Parents could also perceive themselves to be unable to match the economic and social resources of foster carers - what they could offer their children could not be compared with the foster families' resources. Parental visits in the foster home were often problematic; it was hard to interact in a natural way with children. Most parents asked for more visits in their own home, or at a neutral place. In cases were a positive working relationship between parents and foster carers existed, foster carers respected parents, informed them of the everyday life of children, and included them in both minor and major decisions about the child.
Key references
Alpert, L. (2005) 'Research Review: Parents' service experience - a missing element in research on foster care case outcomes.' Child and Family Social Work 10, 361-366.
Kapp, S.A. and Propp, J. (2002) 'Client satisfaction methods: input from parents with children in foster care.' Child and Adolescent Social Work Journal 19, 227-245.
Socialstyrelsen (2006) Social rapport. Stockholm: Socialstyrelsen.
Contact details
Ingrid Höjer, Ph.D, Department of Social Work, Göteborg University, Box 720, 405 30 Göteborg, Sweden
Tel. +46 (0)31 773 15 68
Email: Ingrid.Hojer@socwork.gu.se