Helping foster parents understand the foster child’s perspective: A relational learning framework for foster care

Kelly, Wendy; Salmon, Karen

doi:10.1177/1359104514524067

Cited by 19 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 45 publications

(55 reference statements)

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“…At the beginning of clinical interventions, negative mind-mindedness can offer a precious index of caregivers' ability to connect children's behavior problems and trauma symptoms to the related negative mental states. The understanding of these mental states can be the starting point of a successful intervention (Kelly & Salmon, 2014).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…One of the biggest challenges of caregivers in out-of-home care is to reflect on and understand the mental states of their children, and to link these mental states to their children's behaviors and trauma as well as the relationship with their child (Kelly & Salmon, 2014). The present study investigated a specific form of mental-states understanding or caregivers' mentalization in out-of-home care, mind-mindedness, which is the ability to treat the child as a person with an independent mind (Meins, 1999).…”

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confidence: 99%

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Mind-mindedness in out-of-home Care for Children: Implications for caregivers and child

Colonnesi

Konijn²,

Kroneman

et al. 2021

Curr Psychol

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Most out-of-home placed children have experienced early adversities, including maltreatment and neglect. A challenge for caregivers is to adequately interpret their foster child’s internal mental states and behavior. We examined caregivers’ mind-mindedness in out-of-home care, and the association among caregivers’ mind-mindedness (and its positive, neutral, and negative valence), recognition of the child’s trauma symptoms, and behavior problems. Participants (N = 138) were foster parents, family-home parents, and residential care workers. Caregivers’ mind-mindedness was assessed with the describe-your-child measure. Caregivers’ recognition of the child’s trauma symptoms, their child’s emotional symptoms, conduct problems, prosocial behavior, and quality of the caregiver-child relationship were assessed using caregivers’ reports. Foster parents produced more mental-state descriptors than did residential care workers. General mind-mindedness, as well as neutral and positive mind-mindedness, related negatively to conduct problems. Besides, positive mind-mindedness was associated with prosocial behavior and neutral mind-mindedness with a better quality of the caregiver-child relationship and fewer child conduct problems. Negative mind-mindedness related positively to the caregiver’s recognition of the child’s trauma symptoms, and indirectly, to emotional symptoms. In conclusion, mind-mindedness seems to be an essential characteristic of out-of-home caregivers, connected to the understanding of their child’s behavior problems and trauma symptoms, as well as to the relationship with the child. The findings suggest a possible use of mind-mindedness in out-of-home care evaluation and intervention.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Mind-mindedness in out-of-home Care for Children: Implications for caregivers and child

Colonnesi

Konijn²,

Kroneman

et al. 2021

Curr Psychol

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“…Foster children often suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder as well as more complex traumatic symptoms [29]. Furthermore, the behavior of children in foster care is influenced by a variety of factors including previous experiences of maltreatment and adverse parenting, as well as the impact of separation from birthparents and placement in care [30]. Many of these children have prior histories of maltreatment such as abuse and neglect, with neglect being the most common form of maltreatment and the reason for many children requiring foster care services [27].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

An Investigation of Empathy of Foster Families, Turkey

Vural¹,

Körükçü²,

Aral³

et al. 2016

ujer

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Objectives empathy brings people closer and facilitates communication in almost all the fields of daily life. Having been an important dimension of foster care, empathetic skills should be developed in a foster family. In this study, we aimed to determine the empathic level of the foster families. Methods this cross-sectional study on foster families was performed in Turkey. Research data was collected from 124 fosters parents. Two instruments were used in the survey: the personal information form and the Basic Empathy Scale. The volunteers were chosen by applying a non-probability sampling method, i.e. the "snowball" method. The data were analyzed using SPSS statistical software, Version 18.0. Results, The foster parents had a mean age of 48.37±9.36. Most of foster carers (89.5%) were married. 76.6% of foster families had their own biological child, among them, 29.5% had one, 54.7% had two, and 15.8% had three children. The percentage of foster families that preferred female, and male children, were 76.6%, and 23.4%, respectively. Among the children, who had been placed in foster parent households, 42.7% aged less than 3 years, 31.5% between 4-6 years, and 25.8% more than 7 years. The ratio of parents, who defined foster family concept as "social responsibility," "protection," "own age," and "charity" were 76.6%, 71.1%, 58.1%, and 45.2%, respectively. The ratio of those, who thought that to be a foster carer matured a person, was 62.9%, whereas the ratio of those, who emphasized that they became role model for their environment, was 77.4%. The subjects were asked to empathize with the relevant biological families, and that 59.7% gave first priority to "I want to be sure about my child's safety", 29.8% to "I want to be sure that my child is in good hands", 7.3% to "I want to see that my child is valued". Also 56.5% of foster families pointed out that they were disturbed by the idea that one they the child might be sent back to his/her biological family. General Cronbach's alpha coefficient of the instrument was found to be .76. The empathy scores of foster families in this study were higher than the average. Despite the fact that the foster families hold higher empathic skills in Turkey, it is observed that this service is still conducted with a traditional perspective.

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“…It is therefore imperative that foster parents be well informed about child trauma and its impact on the child’s behaviour. When parents have trauma-informed attributions of children’s behaviours, they are more likely to respond to children’s behaviour problems in a way that helps establish secure relationships (Kelly & Salmon, 2014 ; Sullivan, Murray, & Ake, 2016 ). A secure parent–child relationship is crucial for the development of emotion regulation and self-awareness, and for prevention of behaviour problems (Neece, Green, & Baker, 2012 ).…”

Section: Evaluation Of the Training For Foster Parents ‘Caring For Chmentioning

confidence: 99%

‘Caring for children who have experienced trauma’ – an evaluation of a training for foster parents

Konijn¹,

Colonnesi

Kroneman

et al. 2020

European Journal of Psychotraumatology

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Background: Foster children, mostly maltreated in their birth families, may be fostered by parents who know little about the impact of traumatic experiences. Objective: The present study investigated whether the training Caring for Children who Have Experienced Trauma for foster parents can break the negative circle of traumatic stress. The hypothesis was that improvement in parents' knowledge on trauma and mind-mindedness would be associated with a reduction of their parenting stress, children's post-traumatic stress symptoms, and behaviour problems. Method: Forty-eight foster parents (n female = 35) participated in a pre-test (T1), post-test (T2), and follow-up (T3) assessment. Questionnaires on knowledge on trauma, parenting stress, child post-traumatic stress symptoms, the child's behaviour, and the evaluation of the training were administered. Parents' mind-mindedness was assessed using the describeyour-child interview. Results: Foster parents highly appreciated the training, their knowledge on child trauma increased at T2 and this growth persisted at T3. The parents who gained most knowledge experienced a small decrease in parenting stress at T2. Although the general mindmindedness did not significantly change, foster parents' mind-mindedness with positive valence substantially increased at T2 and T3, while their mind-mindedness with neutral valence decreased. Foster parents' report on child PTSS declined at T3 compared to T2, but not compared to T1. No changes were found in children's behaviour as reported by the foster parents. The proportion of foster children receiving trauma-focused treatment increased at T2 and T3. Conclusion: This study provides evidence that training in trauma-informed parenting can be effective in improving foster parents' knowledge on the impact of traumatic experiences and in increasing a positive mental representation of their foster child as well as in reducing children's post-traumatic symptoms.

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Helping foster parents understand the foster child’s perspective: A relational learning framework for foster care

Cited by 19 publications

References 45 publications

Mind-mindedness in out-of-home Care for Children: Implications for caregivers and child

Mind-mindedness in out-of-home Care for Children: Implications for caregivers and child

An Investigation of Empathy of Foster Families, Turkey

‘Caring for children who have experienced trauma’ – an evaluation of a training for foster parents

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