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Book
Placement in Foster Care Enhances Quality of Attachment Among Young Institutionalized Children
This study examined classifications of attachment in 42-month-old Romanian children (N = 169). Institutionalized since birth, children were assessed comprehensively, randomly assigned to care as usual (CAU) or to foster care, and compared to family-reared children. Attachment classifications for children in foster care were markedly different from those in the CAU. Importantly, children placed in foster care before 24 months were more likely to have secure attachments and if placed earlier were less likely to have disorganized or insecureother attachments. Cognitive status predicted greater likelihood of organized attachment in the CAU and greater likelihood of secure attachment in the foster care and never-institutionalized groups. Foster care is an important intervention to reduce the adverse effects following early deprivation.
Journal Article
Foster
\"An international bestseller and one of The Times's \"Top 50 Novels Published in the 21st Century,\" Claire Keegan's piercing contemporary classic Foster is a heartbreaking story of childhood, loss, and love, now released as a standalone book for the first time ever in the US. It is a hot summer in rural Ireland. A child is taken by her father to live with relatives on a farm, not knowing when or if she will be brought home again. In the Kinsellas' house, she finds an affection and warmth she has not known and slowly, in their care, begins to blossom. But there is something unspoken in this new household-where everything is so well tended to-and this summer must soon come to an end. Winner of the prestigious Davy Byrnes Award and published in an abridged version in the New Yorker, this internationally bestselling contemporary classic is now available for the first time in the US in a full, standalone edition. A story of astonishing emotional depth, Foster showcases Claire Keegan's great talent and secures her reputation as one of our most important storytellers\"-- Provided by publisher.
Book
Enhancing executive functioning among toddlers in foster care with an attachment-based intervention
Young children in foster care often experience adversity, such as maltreatment and lack of stability in early caregiving relationships. As a result, these children are at risk for a range of problems, including deficits in executive functioning. The Attachment and Biobehavioral Catch-up for Toddlers (ABC-T) intervention was designed to help foster parents behave in ways that promote the development of young children's emerging self-regulatory capabilities. Participants included 173 parent–toddler dyads in three groups: foster families that were randomly assigned to receive either the ABC-T intervention (n = 63) or a control intervention (n = 58), as well as low-risk parent–toddler dyads from intact families (n = 52). At a follow-up conducted when children were approximately 48 months old, children's executive functioning abilities were assessed with the attention problems scale of the Child Behavior Checklist (Achenbach & Rescorla, 2000) and a graded version of the Dimensional Change Card Sort developed for preschoolers (Beck, Schaefer, Pang, & Carlson, 2011). Results showed that foster children whose parents received the ABC-T intervention and low-risk children never placed in foster care had fewer parent-reported attention problems and demonstrated greater cognitive flexibility during the Dimensional Change Card Sort than foster children whose parents received the control intervention. These results indicate that an attachment-based intervention implemented among toddlers in foster care is effective in enhancing children's executive functioning capabilities.
Journal Article
What's life like in foster care?
\"This book shows readers what they might expect when entering foster care. The age-appropriate text provides guidance for dealing with the many emotions that come with a major life event such as meeting a new foster family. The book also touches on what to expect if a foster family situation doesn't work out\"--Provided by publisher.
Book
Foster care leads to sustained cognitive gains following severe early deprivation
This study examined longitudinal data from the Bucharest Early Intervention Project, a randomized controlled trial of foster care as an alternative to institutional care following exposure to severe psychosocial deprivation. We report data from 135 participants assessed in early adulthood (age 18 y). We find that 16 y after randomization occurred, those who had been randomized to high-quality foster care had significantly higher IQ scores (9 points, 0.6 SD) than those randomized to care as usual. Mediation analyses provide evidence that the causal effect of the intervention on cognitive ability in early adulthood could be explained, in part, by higher-quality caregiving and attachment security. These findings indicate that early investment in family care as an alternative to institutional care leads to sustained gains in cognitive ability. Fostering caregiving relationships is a likely mechanism of the intervention. In addition, exploratory analyses indicate that stable placements throughout childhood are associated with the greatest long-term gains in cognitive ability. Whether early interventions for infants and young children lead to lasting change has significant implications for decisions to invest in programs aimed at improving children’s developmental outcomes.
Journal Article
Global deficits in executive functioning are transdiagnostic mediators between severe childhood neglect and psychopathology in adolescence
Children reared in institutions experience profound deprivation that is associated with both heightened levels of psychopathology and deficits in executive functioning (EF). It is unclear whether deficits in EF among institutionally-reared children serve as a vulnerability factor that increases risk for later psychopathology. It is also unclear whether this putative association between EF and psychopathology is transdiagnostic (i.e. cuts across domains of psychopathology), or specific to a given syndrome. Thus, we examined whether global deficits in EF mediate the association between severe childhood neglect and general v. specific psychopathology in adolescence.
The sample consisted of 188 children from the Bucharest Early Intervention Project, a longitudinal study examining the brain and behavioral development of children reared in Romanian institutions and a comparison group of never-institutionalized children. EF was assessed at age 8, 12, and 16 using a well-validated measure of neuropsychological functioning. Psychopathology was measured as general (P) and specific internalizing (INT) and externalizing (EXT) factors at age 12 and 16.
Institutionally-reared children had lower global EF and higher general psychopathology (P) at all ages compared to never-institutionalized children. Longitudinal path analysis revealed that the effect of institutionalization on P at age 16 operated indirectly through poorer EF from ages 8 to 12. No indirect effects involving EF were observed for INT or EXT at age 16.
We conclude that stable, global deficits in EF serve as a cognitive endophenotype that increases transdiagnostic vulnerability to psychopathology in adolescence among those who have experienced profound early neglect.
Journal Article
Signs of reactive attachment disorder and disinhibited social engagement disorder at age 12 years: Effects of institutional care history and high-quality foster care
Two disorders of attachment have been consistently identified in some young children following severe deprivation in early life: reactive attachment disorder and disinhibited social engagement disorder. However, less is known about whether signs of these disorders persist into adolescence. We examined signs of reactive attachment disorder and disinhibited social engagement disorder at age 12 years in 111 children who were abandoned at or shortly after birth and subsequently randomized to care as usual or to high-quality foster care, as well as in 50 comparison children who were never institutionalized. Consistent with expectations, those who experienced institutional care in early life had more signs of reactive attachment disorder and disinhibited social engagement disorder at age 12 years than children never institutionalized. In addition, using a conservative intent-to-treat approach, those children randomized to foster care had significantly fewer signs of reactive attachment disorder and disinhibited social engagement disorder than those randomized to care as usual. Analyses within the ever institutionalized group revealed no effects of the age of placement into foster care, but number of caregiving disruptions experienced and the percentage of the child's life spent in institutional care were significant predictors of signs of attachment disorders assessed in early adolescence. These findings indicate that adverse caregiving environments in early life have enduring effects on signs of attachment disorders, and provide further evidence that high-quality caregiving interventions are associated with reductions in both reactive attachment disorder and disinhibited social engagement disorder.
Journal Article