Identity development and self-esteem of young adolescents in foster care

Abstract

For adolescents in foster care progress towards achieving the developmental tasks of adolescence may be more challenging because of the additional stress of being separated from their birth families. Examined in this study is the influence of identification with birth family on the ability of 116 youth in foster care, in a midwestern state, to develop a self-identity and positive self-esteem.Although children in foster care face the same developmental challenges as other children, their struggles for mastery take place within the context of an overwhelming emotional stress--separation from parents (Geiser, 1973). To facilitate a youth's ability to live successfully upon leaving the foster care system, adequate achievement towards accomplishing the developmental tasks of adolescence is necessary. It is adolescence, then, that provides a transitional period to adulthood (Timberlake & Verdieck, 1987) and a time of preparation for life which if not successfully completed could mean failure in one's adult life and successful completion could mean happiness as an adult

Perspectives of Youth in Care in Serbia

“…It is apparent that young people were at first reluctant to talk about their positive qualities, that they did not want ''to boast'', and did not feel comfortable to talk (positively) about themselves. This is comparable with the research findings which established that the global self-image of adolescent males in foster care was not significantly different from that in the general population (Salahu-Din & Bollman, 1994).…”

Ethnic Identity Development Among Adolescents in Foster Care

“…Youth leadership trainings focusing on diversity and antiracism, such as Anytown Arizona and Freedom School, can be useful in providing youth with tools to deal with racism while building cultural competency and increasing youth's sense of personal empowerment. 1 Connection to one's heritage can also be nurtured through activities such as visiting their old neighborhood or learning about their ethnic group's history (Salahu-Din and Bollman 1994). For some youth who have been removed from their culture through placement in foster care, staff and foster parents should be sensitive to the fact that reintroducing the youth to the culture could bring back painful feelings of the loss they experienced through removal from their biological family.…”

“…Qualitative findings indicated that youth placed in kinship care had a more positive sense of their ethnic identity than their peers in non-kinship placements, though the findings must be interpreted with caution given the small sample size and 18% response rate (Schwartz 2007). A study of 116 youth in foster care found that those who had higher levels of identification with their birth family had higher self-esteem (Salahu-Din and Bollman 1994).…”

Placement Instability and Risky Behaviors of Youth Aging Out of Foster Care

“…Low educational achievement, school drop-out rates, identity confusion, low self-esteem, drug use, juvenile arrest and incarceration rates, increased mental health care needs, and social network disruption have all been correlated with placement instability (Barber and Delfabbro 2003;Blome 1997;Herrenkohl et al 2003;Johnson-Reid and Barth 2000;Perry 2006;Ryan et al 2007;Salahu-Din and Bollman 1994;Timberlake and Verdieck 1987).…”