Children in foster care has always been a controversial topic, especially in the western world. The ethicality has been debated pertaining to living conditions and the behavioral outcomes of these children that live their lives in foster care. Ethical considerations were brought to light in accordance with a study done in Romania, named the Bucharest Early Intervention Project. The goal of this project was to see if foster care, as an alternative to institutionalized care, would eliminate social deprivation of these children and would eliminate the additional adverse effects of institutionalization. Romania was chosen in the first place due to a large amount of children finding themselves institutionalized and government officials wondering if, by building a family unit through foster care, these children would be better off. There were obvious risks and benefits seen from this study. The benefits seen were that the children were able to receive proper medical care, referral if needed for identified issues, and more careful scrutiny of the children's' legal situations that could result in them being placed in a better home. Another notable benefit was the legacy of this study, which was the formation of the Institute for Child Development that provides training and further research for foster care families and officials. The risks were, of course, any additional harm to these children. This risk was counteracted with specific protocols to ensure no harm was done to these children. The official result of this study was that the benefits outweighed the risks and foster care is a healthy alternative, or at least more healthy compared to institutionalization, for children.
While in this study children did not experience adverse affects as a result of being placed in a foster home, more often than not they have in other areas of the world other than Romania. A study was done in the United States on the efficacy of different mental health interventions on children in foster care. Approximately 400,000 children every year are in foster care just in the US alone. Due to this, about 50-80% of children raised in foster care meet the criteria for a mental health disorder. The goal of this study was to find mental health interventions that could help foster care children, because, unfortunately, most of the time these children are not able to get help and if they do, it is not effective. One intervention was child-only, three were caregiver-only, and the remaining 6 were child and caregiver. Some of the interventions were tailored to foster care children specifically, and the others were more mainstream interventions that were changed to fit the need of the children's situations. Keeping Foster Parents Trained and Supported was the most effective one in this study.
The Bucharest Early Intervention Project was successful in deciphering whether or not foster care could benefit children as opposed to having them institutionalized. Regarding the ethics of the study, many people agreed that the benefits outweighed the risks, and others disagree. It is important to look at the context of these two studies, though. One study was held in the eastern world, whereas the efficacy of mental health study was done here, in the United States. Both of these countries have different outlooks on mental health and foster care systems generally. This being said, both of these studies proved to be effective in their respective countries. More work will continue to be done to ensure that wherever children are in foster care systems, they will be taken care of.
References:
Zeanah, C. H. (2006). Ethical considerations in international research collaboration: The Bucharest Early Intervention Project. Retrieved December 09, 2020, from https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/imhj.20107?casa_token=SlVRIU4g9FgAAAAA:1lFnIg1kGh-GOncTJ_hfzy24MnA6cc8VAhHrj9V_Of-dSWFsz8raxdSV2rpNc1T3FkLNtkqQ57QSoA
Hambrick, E., Oppenheim-Weller, S., N'zi, A., & Taussig, H. (2016, September 08). Mental health interventions for children in foster care: A systematic review. Retrieved December 10, 2020, from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0190740916302717?casa_token=FRKKU5ZytHwAAAAA%3ApIEGcpwAeHiUXSKVa7lVgOmZcNfddu86mW5XU0DR_GS0pfM3aTg6wdw0JhNuXA7_Tc3T2NApnA
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