Foster parent and teacher assessments of youth in kinship and non-kinship foster care placements: are behaviors perceived differently across settings?

Impact of Kinship Care on Behavioral Well-being for Children in Out-of-Home Care

“…Prior studies have demonstrated that kin caregivers might be less likely to report behavioral problems among children in their care than foster parents or teachers. 44,45 Our analyses did, however, adjust for baseline behavioral assessments, and many of these assessments were provided by the same kin caregivers who later reported outcome data. Finally, the results are not the product of a randomized study and it remains possible that unobserved confounding might explain both the assignment of placement setting and differences in behavioral outcomes.…”

Kinship care: an evolving service delivery option

“…These studies point to rough comparability between children in both settings. The study by Shore, Sim, Le Prohn, and Keller (2002) in this volume adds to the growing literature on children's well-being. In general, they find that children in kin and non-kin care have rates of internalized and externalized behavior problems that are higher than rates for the general population, but that there are few differences in behavior problems between children in kin and non-kin care.…”

Financial well-being in family-based foster care: Exploring variation in income supports for kin and non-kin caregivers in California

“…Examining findings from nine studies from 1994 to 2004, Winokur et al (2009) concluded that children in non-relative foster care were more likely to receive mental health services than children placed in kinship foster care, though it is unclear whether these differences in mental health utilization were due to underlying differential need between children in kin and non-kin care, or differences in knowledge and/or access to care among kin and non-kin providers. One explanation for differences in receipt of formal mental health treatment draws from evidence that the same child behavior may be interpreted or reported differently, based on the caregiver relationship to the child (Gebel, 1996;Rosenthal & Curiel, 2006;Timmer, Sedlar, & Urquiza, 2004;), and that kin may provide positively skewed assessments of the behavior of children in their care (Barth, 2008;Shore, Sim, Le Prohn, & Keller, 2002), which might result in children receiving less formal treatment for their behavior because caregivers do not perceive it as sufficiently problematic or warranting intervention (Daly & Perry, 2011).…”