Interviews were conducted with 20 parents in the US who have adopted one or more children from China. The study focuses on the motivation to adopt, decision making regarding adoption and the process in relation to rational choice theory. The interviews also inquired about their required adoption trip to China and the post-adoption adjustment phase including bonding and developmental delays, as well as about why families chose to adopt from China, how they learned about the adoption agency they used and whether or not they knew families that had adopted internationally and more specifically from China. This information provided insight into the way that families obtained information that helped them reach important decisions throughout the adoption process. / Master of Science

This thesis examines the motivations for states to become involved in intercountry adoption. This includes both states that send children in intercountry adoption and states that receive children. The thesis explores the dynamic cycle of events that lead states to intercountry adoption participation. It then explores the ramifications of those for the application and interpretation of the ‘best interests of the child’ standard. This thesis includes empirical work through data gathered by interviews and analysed by constructivist grounded theory methodology. It also includes a comparative analysis of seven different states involved in intercountry adoption. The comparative analysis is again undertaken with the use of constructivist grounded theory methodology. The thesis presents a theory that explains state motivation to engage in intercountry adoption and the effects that these have on the normative meaning that is given to the ‘best interests of the child’ legal standard when used in intercountry adoption. This thesis makes an original contribution of knowledge by examining the motivation of states to enter into intercountry adoption and providing a theory that traces the pathways of how states become involved. It makes further original contributions to knowledge by examining how these motivations impact the normative meaning given to the standard in domestic, international and transnational settings. Yet another original contribution to knowledge is in providing a theory and network map of the normative meanings that are ascribed to the standard in an intercountry adoption setting.

Call number: LD2668 .R4 1967 W34

No description available.

This study explored the beliefs and assumptions that affect professionals in the decision making process about contact between children in permanent alternative care and their birth parents. Nine professionals from three groups, guardian ad Litems; judges and independent experts, were interviewed, using semi-structured interviews. The verbatim transcripts of these interviews were the data for an interpretative phenomenological analysis. Five overarching themes emerged in guiding the work of professionals, which were described as, parental capacity; children's rights and wishes; contact as central to identity; the safety and the age of the child. There were seven other common themes, which were described as, permanency and stability; having an open mind; adoption as different to other forms of permanency; attachment; ethnicity/race/gender/culture; views of alternative parents and power and responsibility. Three themes occurred in only one group or individual interview, and were described as, having differing and conflicting views to others; contact as having a symbolic function and the law as paramount. The guardian ad Litems emphasised the importance of contact as central to identity, and were strongly influenced by research supporting this view. They often felt disempowered in legal proceedings. The experts took a "detached" evidence based position, and were particularly concerned about the safety and emotional needs of children. The judges worked within a legal framework, within which individual differences emerged. The issue of power and responsibility given to certain discourses is discussed. The similarities and differences within and between groups are understood in terms of the different ways in which professionals position themselves in relation to contact, based on professional roles and responsibilities, within a social and cultural framework, and influenced by a range of professional and personal experiences'. Consideration is given to how the themes are played out in discourses used to present and argue a position. A number of tensions and contradictions emerged. Findings were considered in the light of outcome research and a social constructionist perspective". The co-ordinated management of meanings". Possible recommendations for ways in which professionals may become more aware of their beliefs and assumptions affecting decision making about contact, are made. The open and thoughtful manner in which professionals responded to the research interview and sought feedback supports the idea that greater openness in the decision making process about contact, between children in permanent alternative care and their birth parents, would be beneficial.

Early conceptualisations of Attachment Theory placed considerable emphasis on the importance of early experiences of relationships on development throughout life. Central to the theory is the notion that early experiences determine internalised representations of relationships and experience which subsequently affect the way individuals perceive themselves in relation to others. However, the evidence suggests that development is not so deterministic and that the impact of early adversity can be overcome through reparative experiences. The current study is part of a larger longitudinal investigation concerned with the impact of pure non attachment on development. The study reported in this thesis aims to consider the impact of early non attachment in adulthood, by exploring the sense that adults have made of their lives having been placed in institutionalised care in early childhood, with no opportunity to develop attachment, and who were then adopted or restored to biological parents. The meanings given to these experiences were explored by conducting a Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis of the accounts given by 15 participants using the Adult Attachment Interview. The results of the study suggest that the over all experience of non attachment did not prevent or severely inhibit development. However, six themes were identified in the study which highlight difficulties in people's ability to make sense of the pastJUld how they function in the present. The findings provide further insight into the impact of early non-attachment in adulthood and suggest that internalised representations of relationships may have a lasting influence, although alternative experience can ameliorate their impact.

Thesis (M.S.)--Boston University

This study examines the confluence of practices that are generated when the state brings strangers together to make a brand new family. Concerns about matching, the process in which an adoptive family is made, are driving significant changes in the organisation of adoption services yet 'research evidence is lacking- not just sparse, but virtually absent' (Quinton, 2012, p.1). This study addresses these gaps and offers original empirical and conceptual contributions to the knowledge base. My approach draws on sociological and anthropological perspectives through which family life is understood as constructed through day-to-day activities, action, imagination and emotional interactions. This study focuses on the 'doing' of family and the 'doing' of social work to illuminate and analyse everyday practices. The research design is original in the field and builds on innovative methodologies at the interface of pedagogy, practice and research. Through a psychoanalytically informed multi- modal ethnographic study I observed a single matching process in 'real time' over 9 months. This methodology afforded direct access to dyadic, familial, professional and organizational relationships in homes, offices, forums, in documents and in email correspondence. Group analytic practices were used to help access subjective and sociocultural dimensions. The data generated from these groups (which included adults adopted from care, adoptive parents, researchers, social workers and policy advisors) allowed the juxtaposition of contemporary matching practices with intergenerational perspectives. Collaborative processes brought a multiplicity of minds to the study helping maintain a recursive and critically reflective approach. This unique data-set provides an opportunity to consider matching through multiple lenses and as a lens through which to consider multiple practices. This thesis makes four analytical claims. Firstly, I suggest that during a matching process intense emotional forces, multiple paradoxes and uncertainty converge, creating a 'liminal hotspot' (Greco and Stenner, 2017, p.147). For those directly involved, (including children, carers, prospective parents and professionals) navigating this space requires spatialized and temporalized strategies. In this study social work practices were found to function as necessary rites of passage, tools and processes which could also mitigate polarizing forces. Secondly, I suggest that matching is a site where work and non-work practices become entangled. In the midst of these entanglements those involved have to navigate 'distinct cultures of child rearing' (Thomson et al., 2011, p.4). In this context the role of the foster carer emerges as extraordinarily complex. Thirdly, this thesis claims that current powerful social projections and transformative processes are played out and become visible within matching practices. Matching practices are considered to be an epistemic lens into a matrix of tensions relating to care and authority. Finally, this research suggests that reductions in welfare spending, increasing pressures on services and a policy pre-occupation with timeliness are undermining essential deliberative processes. This study found that this is a high risk situation; creating unnecessary vulnerability across a workforce, across multiple families and ultimately in the lives of children.

<p>Varje år adopteras 800 barn från hela världen till Sverige genom internationella adoptioner. Uppsatsens syfte var att spegla hur adoptionen påverkat tre unga adopterade kvinnors identitetsutveckling där deras anknytningsprocess och etniska ursprung har haft stor betydelse. Denna c-uppsats visar att adoptionen alltid kommer att spegla en individs liv och val. Dock finns det andra faktorer under uppväxten som om möjligt har större betydelse för en individs utveckling, detta blev även uppsatsens slutsats För att komma fram till ett resultat har en kvalitativ undersökning genomförts med tre stycken intervjuer, som redovisar familjeförhållanden, sociala relationer, tonårsperiod samt deras situation idag. Resultatet har analyserats utifrån anknytningsteorin, identitetsutveckling samt ur ett etnicitetsperspektiv.</p>

No description available.