Search

Background While studies of ex-orphanage care show adverse effects on development, the longer-term impact on mid-life psychosocial functioning and physical health has not been established. Methods Orphanage records provided baseline data on a sample of 100 Hong Kong Chinese girls who were subsequently adopted into the UK. A mid-life follow-up using standardised questionnaires and face-to-face interviews assessed current circumstances, life satisfaction and mental and physical health outcomes. Comparisons were made with age-matched UK-born adopted and nonadopted women. Results Half the group spent between 1 and 2 years in orphanages, average age at adoptive placement was 23 months and 72% participated in the follow-up. Despite this poor early start, mid-life outcomes were commensurate with the comparison groups in terms of mental and physical health measures. Serious psychiatric and social difficulties were largely absent. Although the timing and extent of exposure to orphanage care did not influence outcome, participants' reports of poorer quality adoptive family experience and a negative view of their adoption were significantly associated with poorer mental health outcomes (difference in means = 0.76, 95% CI 1.33-0.19, p = .01; difference in means = 1.2, 95% CI 0.68-1.73, p = .01, respectively). Conclusions Moderately depriving orphanage care did not predict enduring adverse consequences in mid-life but subsequent poor adoption experience was associated with outcome. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the field of international adoption there has been a long-standing concern that transracially adopted people experience social dislocation from both their communities of origin and the communities in which they grew up. Alan Rushton, Margaret Grant, John Simmonds and Julia Feast of the British Chinese Adoption Study team explore this notion in relation to a sample of 72 ex-orphanage, Hong Kong-born women adopted into British families in the 1960s. The authors report on how the women choose to identify themselves in mid life. The article describes the development and use of specially devised questionnaires to explore community connectedness and self-regard among this group of women. Further analysis examines the relationship between community connectedness and psychological well-being. The findings are then positioned in the context of the narrative data from face-to-face interviews with the women. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most research looking at the role of adopters in the adoption, search and reunion process has tended to focus on the experiences of either the adoptive mother or both adoptive parents as a unit. As a result, the role of the adoptive father has had a much lower profile in the literature and research available to practitioners and professionals. Julia Feast, Fiona Kyle and John Triseliotis seek to redress the balance by analysing data from a previous study by Triseliotis et al (2005) from adoptive fathers' point of view. That study examined the experiences of a large cohort of adoptive parents whose son or daughter had searched or been sought. Most adoptive parents expressed overall satisfaction with the outcome of contact, but there were inevitable strains. By exploring whether or not the anxieties, stress levels and experiences of adoptive fathers differ significantly from those of adoptive mothers, we hope to provide a greater understanding of how adoptive fathers manage the search and reunion process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]