What Was It Like? – Care Leavers’ Accounts of Moving In and Between Care Placements

Mariela Neagu, PhD student, REES Centre, Dept. of Education, University of Oxford, United Kingdom This doctoral research is a qualitative study which looks at the life trajectories of 39 Romanian care leavers and adoptees in their 20s and it seeks to explore their experiences in different types of placement (foster care, residential and adoption) as they perceived them.   During […]

Disruptions and continuities in young peoples’ transitions to adulthood

Anna-Marie Herdtle, PhD student, University of Luxemburg, Luxemburg  The aim of this presentation is to reconstruct how young people in foster care experience continuities and/or disruptions during their transitions to adulthood. Combining an understanding of identity as an ongoing process aiming at the reconciliation between inner and outer exigencies which can be quite contradictory (cf. Keupp et al. 1999) […]

Experiences of women fostering a victim of maternal sexual abuse

Dorijn Wubs, PhD student, University of Groningen, the Netherlands  Hans  Grietens, Researcher University of Groningen, the Netherlands  Laura  Batstra, Researcher, University of Groningen, the Netherlands     Although the consequences for all victims of child sexual abuse are serious, when a child is abused by mother figure, the abuse is considered to be especially harmful. Yet, maternal sexual abuse remains a taboo, as females are often not […]

Flemish foster children on their foster care placement: a qualitative study

Johan Vanderfaeillie, Researcher, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium  Ann Clé, Researcher, Vijre Universiteit Brussel, Belgium  Frank Van Holen, Researcher, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium       In Flanders, a family foster care placement is the option of choice for children in need of out-of-home care. For both birth parents and children, placing a child in out-of-home care is a far reaching decision. However, little is known about how children themselves live […]