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Paper

Short-term effects of parental risk contexts in infants’ development

abstract

Background. Literature indicates that infants' abandonment and negligence is related to parental factors such as alcohol and drug addiction (Larsson & Ekenstein, 1983), and sexual and mental disorders (Bonnet, 1993). The effects that those kinds of risk factors have in the family context, and subsequently in the developmental outcomes of very young children, are very well known (Cicchetti et al, 2006). Some short-term developmental effects identified in the literature are (Egeland et al, 1998; Chasnoff et al, 1991; Nair et al, 1997): premature baby (<37 weeks); low birth weight (<2500 grs); avoidant/ambivalent and emotionally negative relations; and frustration behaviours. Psychopathology and low rates in cognitive and socio-emotional development are the long-term effects found at three and four years of age (Ainsworth, 1978; Byrd, 1999). However, there is evidence in the literature that indicates that the long term effects of early exposition to risk contexts depend on the quality of the existing official responses for abandoned babies (Johnson et al, 2006).

International literature on social intervention in the topic of child protection, before and after 1975, shows some changes in the way national state child welfare responses are conceived and implemented (Bullock, R., et al, 1993). Empirical studies emphasize the need for family-type responses, especially for very young children. When no other response is available and foster care is the only option, placements should occur during the minimal length of time possible and the institution should have a stable, home-like environment where children are engaged in consistent and emotionally positive relations with their caregivers.

In Portugal, foster care is still the main child welfare response for at-risk infants removed from their homes by the court and abandoned newborns. Due to the slow and not always effective process of parental rights' termination and adoption of the child, removal is most frequently associated with long periods of foster care placement. Furthermore, portuguese foster care institutions have not been consistent with the scientific orientations referred and child welfare policy and services are slow and burocratic.

In this sense, in order to assess the 'evidence-base' of intervention with vulnerable and at-risk infants, as is the purpose of this conference, there is a need to adequately evaluate the child when entering foster care facilities, prior to intervention and, thus, acknowledge the effects of the risk context to which the child has been exposed to in early years.

Taking all of this into account, the immediate evaluation of infants removed from their homes and placed in foster care contributes to: 1) the development of interventions focused on the specific needs of each child; 2) the evaluation of the intervention efficacy using the evaluation as a baseline for future post-intervention comparisons; 3) the identification of early exposition to risk contexts effects' on the child; and, thus, 4) the identification of foster care placement effects on the child.

 

Purpose. Having in mind the ideas discussed, our goal is to: 1) Characterize a sample of infants entering Portuguese foster care institutions; 2) Identify short term developmental effects of being exposed to risk contexts in early years; and 3) Comparatively access different groups of infants in order to evaluate the efficacy of new intervention programs.

Fifty abandoned and/or at-risk infants (1-7 months) were evaluated while integrated in two distinguished developmental contexts: their biological families; and foster care.

Griffiths' Mental Development Scale was used to access child development in the following areas: locomotor, personal/social, hearing/speech, eye-hand coordination, and performance. Global development quotient and the subscales quotients were obtained.

Physical development data (e.g. Head circumference, weight, length, gestational age, Apgar) as well as family information (e.g. risk factors) and sociodemographic data were also collected.

Infants in foster care were evaluated after one month of placement in the new developmental context.

Descriptive analysis was made for the group of infants in foster care and statistical comparison was made for the two groups.

 

Key findings. The results showed that infants entering Portuguese foster care institutions after being exposed to parental risk contexts tend to: 1) be premature (33,4%) and have low birth weight (42,9%); 2) have drug addicted parents (33,3%); 3) have parents lacking parental competencies (57,1%) or have been abandoned (23,9%); and 4) have values of both global and subscales quotients above the mean score of normative populations.

This study stresses the importance of developing early intervention programs that may prevent the negative effects of risk pregnancies and risk familiar contexts on infants. It mainly highlights that both the long and short-term detrimental effects of parental risk contexts in infants must be considered in the design and conceptualization of the official responses given to abandoned and at-risk babies removed from their homes.

 

Key references

Bullock, R., Little, M., & Milham, S. (1993). Residential care for children. A review of the research. London: HMSO.

Johnson, R., Browne, K., & Hamilton-Giachritsis, C. (2006). Young Children in Institutional Care at Risk of Harm. Trauma, Violence and Abuse, 7(1), 34-60.

 

Contacts: Leonor Rodrigues, ISCTE - Higher Institute of Social Sciences and Business Studies; CIS - Research Centre for Social Research and Intervention, Av. das Forças Armadas, sala 2w10, 1649-026 Lisboa, Portugal, Email: leonor.rodrigues@iscte.pt, Phone: 00351 21 790 39 62.

 

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