Orphaned children are among a group of persons that experience moderate to extreme developmental issues. They never receive a beneficial amount of social interaction to prepare them for the world and many end up relying on the state for funds, housing, insurance, and more because their exposure to economic life is nonexistent and they have only been to know their institutionalized life. Zeanah et al. (2006) went to Bucharest, Romania with the idea of an early-intervention program for institutionalized children up to 30 months of age that had met two criteria: 1. had spent at least half of their life in the institution and 2. passed basic health assessments. The experiment was to demonstrate the effects of institutionalization and foster care on a child's development over time. There were two groups, care as usual (remained institutionalized) and those in foster care. The hypotheses consisted of: 1. The development of children raised by a family would be enhanced compared with that of children raised in institutions; 2. The longer children remained in the institutions the more compromised their development would be; 3. The age at which children are placed into foster care may play a role in their development and may play an important role over time. Using the guidelines for a longitudinal study, the researchers developed the understanding that the effects of foster care were far better than those who remained in an institution. They theorized this as the lack of affection would impede on the cognitive and neural development, as well as early child development.
Recently a book was published, Young People Leaving State Care in China (Shang & Fisher, 2017) and talks about institutionalization in China and the mechanisms of how it works but mainly about the children that come from these state institutions. It is stated in the book that once children are in an institution the only way to get out is to be adopted or to mature and eventually be set into the world without any knowledge of how the world works. As a result, they face serious challenges "to establishing an independent life, employment, housing and social connections when they enter adulthood" (Shang & Fisher, 2017). There is positive and negative feedback on both types of care, state and foster, and how they affected people interviewed in the book by explaining how the positive and negative interactions made each person feel. The positives of foster care were rooted in the reliability of parents to take care of the children. The positives of state institutions were limited to feeling cared for by those they could not form formal relationships with (i.e. other children, staff, caregivers). The negatives of foster care were the effects of lost affectionate relationships and a sense of misplacement due to foster parents giving more affectionate, warming, and tailored care to their birth children. The negatives of the institutions goes on about emotional support, social support, physical abuse, and more.
The underlying argument is that if foster caregivers were trained in programs like in the BEIP, then maybe caregivers would be more willing to take on caring for one or two more children. There is government support when fostering, but many people look at that simply as extra spending money. Foster care is a wonderful opportunity to give a child a semi-normal life to allow them to be socially and emotionally engaged. Without those types of interactions, many will fail in modern society because they will be unable to form different types of relationships whether is is friendship, romantic, or professional. Continuing to push for foster care to eliminate institutional care is not simple, but must be taken seriously around the globe.
References
Shang, X., & Fisher, K. (2017). Young people leaving state care in China. Bristol, UK; Chicago, IL, USA: Bristol University Press. doi:10.2307/j.ctt22p7km9
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