Birth Family Contact Experiences Among Lesbian, Gay, and Heterosexual Adoptive Parents With School‐Age Children

Abstract

Objective To examine how lesbian, gay, and heterosexual adoptive parents navigate openness dynamics with children's birth family across a 5‐year period, when children are preschool‐ to school‐age. Background Few studies regarding birth family contact have included longitudinal data as well as a sample of adoptive parents of varying sexual orientations. Thus, this study used a multiprong theoretical approach grounded in emotional distance regulation, families of choice, and gender theory. Method A mixed‐methods approach with longitudinal quantitative survey and qualitative interview data from 106 lesbian, gay, and heterosexual adoptive parent families was employed to examine the type of contact, its frequency, who was involved, perceptions of this contact, and the extent to which formal agreements exist between adoptive and birth families regarding contact. Results Findings revealed variations in the status and perceptions of contact across adoptive families. We also discovered that many lesbian and gay adoptive parents reported that birth parents had intentionally selected a same‐sex adoptive couple, and birth parents appeared to have distinct reasons for this choice. Conclusion Although some differences in birth family contact distinguished lesbian, gay, and heterosexual adoptive parent families, these families generally appeared more similar than different. Implications Implications—particularly a need for demonstrated competencies in adoption openness—are discussed for adoption professionals in policy, practice, and legal realms.

Queering Methodologies to Understand Queer Families

“…Unlike other cultural groups, queer people are defined by individual identities, and the study of queer people historically has been based in the medical and developmental sciences (Richardson & Seidman, ). We observe that family relationships are understood intergenerationally, yet the identity of queer families is often traced to individuals or couples whose personal identities become the basis for a family's queerness (e.g., families may be queer because children come out as LGBTQ [Grafsky, Hickey, Ngyuen, & Wall, ; Jhucin, 2018]; families may be queer because adult relationships that define them comprise those who are LGBTQ [Carroll, ; Farr, Ravvina, & Grotevant, ; Prendergast & MacPhee, ; Rupple et al, 2018]). Thus, our focus has remained on LGBT‐identified people as children or parents raising children, foci that, in the context of the study of families, is itself heteronormative.…”

Sexual‐ and Gender‐Minority Families: A 2010 to 2020 Decade in Review

“…Adoption is a second key parenthood pathway for SGM adults (Baumle & Compton, ), with an estimated one in five same‐sex couples raising adopted children, relative to about 3% of different‐sex couples raising adopted children; 3% of same‐sex couples have foster children, relative to 0.4% of heterosexual parents (Goldberg & Conron, ). However, research suggests some religiously affiliated adoption agencies restrict the availability of adoption due to the stigmatization of SGM as unfit parents (Farr, Ravvina, & Grotevant, ).…”

“It wasn't feasible for us”: Queer Women of Color Navigating Family Formation

“…Lesbian couples' and single LBQ women's access to adoption and biological reproduction is an innovation of the second half of the 20th century (see also in this issue: Farr, Ravvina, & Grotevant, 2018;Prendergast & MacPhee, 2018). Most medical professionals refused to inseminate openly LBQ women until the late 1980s, and early commercial sperm banks typically shipped only to medical facilities (Agigian, 2004;Batza, 2016).…”