After a quantitative analysis of 138 children, (109 placements), who were placed for adoption in one authority either during 1993/4 and 1996/7, the study developed into a qualitative study of letterbox contact after adoption. Letterbox is a form of indirect communication through an intermediary post box system between adoptive families and birth family members. The profiles of the children, their birth and adoptive families, and proposed contact plans were explored. With a mean age 6.24 years, 30% of them were foster-adopt placements. 87% were the subject of care orders, with a high incidence of abuse or neglect Within an average of 2.3 years after placement, all were adopted. The adoption panel envisaged that 18.9% of the group would have direct contact 12.9% 'no contact'. For 47 children letterboxes were set up after the adoption. The study was not set up to measure the outcome of the adoption placements, but after 4/5 years, remarkably, only 5.8% placements had disrupted. A qualitative analysis was undertaken 4/5 years post- placement of the 47 children with letterboxes. This involved 87 sets of adult interviews, and seven young people. For 33 of the children, both the birth family member and adopted parent were interviewed. Pre-placement meetings were very highly valued. 40% of birth mothers had learning disability, 38% mental health problems - inevitably they would require support for letterbox. Using grounded theory, ten classifications of letterbox functioning were developed. 21% of them were working well, 47% working but with reservations, (eg. changed to one way, confusing for the child, frustratingly superficial in content). 28% were not working - children left with sadness and regret Children valued the letters but increasingly their questions of 'why?' were unanswered. Many were confused, their early rejection reinforced by references to newborn siblings. If not functioning, the contact was less likely to move to direct contact Interviews of birth families revealed a disparity between stories, and frequent denial of responsibility. Finally, families of 90.4% of the initial group, (now aged 14.2 years), were reinterviewed ten years post placement 38% of letterboxes continued to operate but only one without complications; for the others the frustration and questions were increasing, or they had been further hurt by the rejection of birth parents ceasing communication. They had benefited from ten years of adoption stability, equipping them to cope with adversity of contact or their search for identity. Improved defining of objectives, more detailed background information, a low-key review system and pro-active professional intervention/mediation could influence letterbox outcomes. Letterboxes proved increasingly complex over time. With over half the study children living outside the authority boundaries, the Support Regulations (2003) will need adequate resourcing to meet the complex, geographically remote demands for the coherent support of all parties to letterbox.

Literature Review: Qualitative research was reviewed to better understand parents’ experiences of caring for children who had been adopted from care. A systematic search of the existing literature was conducted and a quality appraisal tool was employed to select 10 studies that explored adoptive care-giving from a multi-national perspective. A meta-synthesis identified six experiential themes: Preparedness and adjustment; identity and competency; responsiveness and reflectivity; commitment and resilience; containment and support; and cohesion and integration. The findings suggested that parents felt unsupported post-adoption, and prompted clinical recommendations about how multi-agency teams could work collaboratively with parents and their family networks to ensure that adopters felt supported. More research is warranted to understand the experiences of British adoptive parents. Research Report: The experiences of six British parents who self-identified that caring for an adoptee had been more challenging than initially expected were explored using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. Three super-ordinate themes were identified: ‘living in a different world’ illustrated the emotional distress and social isolation that adopters encountered; ‘what’s going on in their little minds’ illuminated parents’ intense desire to make sense of their ‘damaged’ children and provide reparative care; whilst ‘parenting on another level’ alluded to adopters’ experiences of striving for balance and holding hope for the future. Implications for specialist inter-agency working were discussed and included increased professional collaboration, offering of psychological therapies to ameliorate adopters’ distress, and greater partnership working to facilitate parents in sustaining their care-giving roles. Recommendations for further research were to explore parents’ experiences of care-giving at different phases of the adoption life-cycle, and investigate powerful transferences occurring between parent and child that seemed to impact on parents’ experiences of care-giving. Critical Appraisal: A reflective account of the research process has been provided and highlights issues that emerged as the researcher endeavoured to undertake good quality research.

An increasing number of looked-after children are being placed for adoption in accordance with the government drive to increase permanency for children in local authority care. Unfortunately it is estimated that approximately one fifth of all adoptive placements end in disruption. Previous studies attempting to identify factors associated with disruption have tended to focus on demographic details and assessment data to predict increased risk. Few attempts have been made to explore the phenomenon in more depth by considering the views and accounts of the individuals involved. This study explores the experience of adoption disruption from the perspective of the adoptive mothers. It considers their understanding of the main contributing factors and their views on how services could be improved.

This PhD project addresses the political, economic and cultural geographies of transnational child adoption. The research conducts a detailed exploration of two key elements with this complex and rapidly evolving practice of family development. First, it examines the legal and fiscal transactions that are required for transnational child adoption (TNA) within key receiving countries. Focusing on TNA practice trends within the US and UK, it explores the regulations and economies of this unique family building process on local, national and global scales. The aim of the research is to accurately describe the political economies and geographies of TNA receiving families residing in the UK and the US. Secondly, this project explores key debates within public discourse around reproductive options that inform the rhetoric around receiving families as distinctly ‘modern’ family formations. It addresses the ways the new practice is differentiated, normalised or negotiated in relation to both understandings of the family and relatedness as well as wider issues of multiculturalism, transnationalism, social capital production and the technical intensity of modern reproductive practices. In particular, this work considers the extended geographies of receiving families that are conventionally represented in relation to notions of relatedness and family through ideas of intimacy, closeness and proximity. This thesis responds to an urgent need for more updated and comprehensive quantitative, qualitative and legal research on the recent escalation of TNA in comparison with other globalized family building alternatives that have similarly broadened in parental accessibility over the same period. Based on a critical review of current TNA practice, this research explores how and why TNA has become a contested topic of public discourse and increased in cultural visibility in excess of its numerical significance relative to other forms of family formation.

Although there is now accumulating evidence on the experiences and outcomes for internationally adopted adults, and recent findings suggest an association between outcomes and individuals’ views of their own adoption, there has been little systematic examination of the adoption appraisal process beyond childhood. This study focuses on adopted women’s perceptions of how being internationally adopted in early childhood has affected their subsequent lives. 68 women of Chinese ethnicity in their 40s and 50s, adopted as young girls in the 1960s from orphanages in Hong Kong to the UK, participated in face-to-face interviews. Based on a phenomenological analysis of the resulting data, I argue that appraisal of adoption (including adjustment to adoption-related losses and gains) is a multi-faceted and dynamic process that continues long beyond childhood and adolescence. Particular attention is paid to how women describe talking about adoption to strangers and loved ones and how they frame their responses in the context of the research interview. Out of this work emerges a clearer picture of the importance of understanding individual perceptions of what constitutes a ‘positive’ adoption outcome. By adding to and extending the (mainly US-based) emerging body of literature on internationally adopted adults, the results of this study provide a starting point for thinking about the future development of a model of understanding adoption appraisal in adulthood: one that builds on, but is distinct from, models of children’s adoption appraisal.

The aim of this thesis is to convey a psycho-social and experiential understanding of the lived experience of trans-racial adoption. As a woman that was adopted as a baby from Malaysia by Caucasian parents during the 1970s, the personal experience of the phenomenon of trans-racial adoption has been integral to the theoretical foundations and overall research approach of this study. The primary aim of this study has been one that has sought to deepen understanding of the affective dimensions involved in being a trans-racially adoptive family member from both the perspective of the adoptive mother and the adoptee. The concept of trans-racial adoptive subjectivity is informed by phenomenological and psychoanalytic thinking and assumes an embodied subject that is embedded in a relational and material world. The analytical focus therefore prioritises understanding the historical, social and political processes that engage the body in particular ways that we can understand as being trans-racially adopted. The research framework assumes a psycho-social methodological framework that has prioritised depth of understanding experience. Six sets of trans-racially adopted adults and their adoptive mothers were engaged where each family members was interviewed over a period of six months, four times each. Influenced by the relational psychoanalytic tradition, the notion of inter-subjectivity was central to the methodological process. The research interview encounters therefore assumed a two person psychology where the feelings I experienced as the researcher were considered as important forms of research data. An inter-subjective dialogue enabled the method to go beyond purely the discursive and recognise the complex layers of unconscious forms of defence that are understood as being the multi-dimensions of experience. The empirical chapters have been presented in three separate analytical chapters entitled: Race, Class and Loss. In theorising an embodied subject, I have emphasised in this interpretation of trans-racial adoptive experience the inter-connection between these three analytical categories. That whilst presented as separate categories, the presentation of the experience in each empirical chapter has aimed to demonstrate the fluidity involved in the process of being trans-racially adopted.

The focus of this thesis is upon the Adoption Support Plan (ASP), one of the documents constructed for new adoptions of children in the UK. The Adoption and Children Act, 2002, made provision for support in adoption through the right to request an assessment of support. The recognition of support for adoption has emerged as the nature of adoption has changed with fewer children being relinquished at birth. Children adopted from social care are generally older and more likely to have experienced trauma and broken attachments. The ‘closed’ nature of the adoption of babies has become more ‘open’ with arrangements such as contact with birth families and access to birth records (Lowe, 1999). It is now understood that adoption is associated with life-long periods of adjustment which can require different levels of support. However little is known about how support is assessed and introduced for new adoptions. A documentary analysis method explored the ways in which the ASP operated within the wider adoption context. Qualitative interviews were also undertaken. The findings highlight that the ASP focused mainly on the matching arrangements concerning the child’s past and present needs, with little consideration of potential future support that might be required. Adopters were largely unaware of the existence and purpose of the ASP to support the adoptive family and their future. Two proposals are made to raise the status and visibility of the ASP during the arrangements for adoption. Firstly, the document should be redesigned and it should be ‘co-produced’ following the placement, allowing the Review to agree the negotiated support requirements. Secondly, a strategic interagency commitment to space for adoption support within mainstream family support services should be established, requiring a programme of information for the public and training for all providers regarding the normative aspects of adoption and the value of support.

The study explored the narratives of three adoptive couples. The participants were selected using criterion based convenience and snowball sampling. The adoptive couples’ data was captured through written narratives and/or individual or joint semi-structured interviews. The data was then analysed by means of thematic analysis conducted from the perspective of second order cybernetics. The results note the participants’ experiences of their infertility threatened their functioning as a couple. However, this threat to the couples’ functioning was limited by the adoptions through two means. First, the adoptions limited the couples’ communication about their infertility. Second, the adoptions allowed the couples to continue functioning as a couple dedicated to the goal of becoming parents. Differences between the participant couples’ experiences surrounded their interactions with social workers; their selection of support structures; their interaction with external systems; as well as their anxiety towards the individuation of the adopted child. / Psychology / M.A. (Clinical Psychology)

The study explored the narratives of three adoptive couples. The participants were selected using criterion based convenience and snowball sampling. The adoptive couples’ data was captured through written narratives and/or individual or joint semi-structured interviews. The data was then analysed by means of thematic analysis conducted from the perspective of second order cybernetics. The results note the participants’ experiences of their infertility threatened their functioning as a couple. However, this threat to the couples’ functioning was limited by the adoptions through two means. First, the adoptions limited the couples’ communication about their infertility. Second, the adoptions allowed the couples to continue functioning as a couple dedicated to the goal of becoming parents. Differences between the participant couples’ experiences surrounded their interactions with social workers; their selection of support structures; their interaction with external systems; as well as their anxiety towards the individuation of the adopted child. / Psychology / M.A. (Clinical Psychology)

S’interroger sur l’adoption, dans un contexte d’évolution controversée des représentations de la parenté en Tunisie, oblige à s’attarder sur l'arrière plan social, culturel et juridique dans lequel elle s'inscrit. Le discours social sur l’adoption continue à promouvoir l’idée d’une bipartition de la parenté entre une parenté biologique, « de sang » ou « naturelle » et une parenté sociale, « affective »ou encore « du cœur ». A partir de témoignages de parents adoptifs et des adoptés, nous avons essayé de relever les différentes dimensions de l’épreuve d’adoption et des relations au sein de la parenté adoptive. L’étude des différents points soulevés permet d’emblée de questionner la place de la pluriparentalité à travers les pratiques et les représentations de la filiation adoptive dans un contexte socio-politique en mouvance. Elle permet en outre de déterminer le rapport entre la généalogie et la subjectivité dans le processus de la construction identitaire. / Questioning adoption, in a context of a controversial evolution of the representations of parenthood in Tunisia, compels one to dwell upon the social, cultural and legal backgrounds where it belongs. Social discourse on adoption continues to promote the idea of a dichotomy of parenthood, divided between biological parenthood - "blood" or "natural" parenthood- and social parenthood - "emotional" or "heart-based" parenthood. Based on accounts of adoptive parents and adoptees, we tried to identify the different dimensions of the experience of adoption and of the relationships within the adoptive parenthood. In building a relationship of adoption, representations appear as a primary mediator. The study of the various points raised directly questions the role of multi parenting through the practices and representations of adoptive kinship in a socio-political movement. It also allows to determine the relationship between genealogy and subjectivity in the process of identity construction.