Parenting and development of adoptees

Parenting

Biological ties are the hallmark of parent-child relationships, and its absence has caused concern throughout the history of adoption. The traditional concern is expressed by no less an authority than Jessie Taft, a pioneer in the professionalization of adoption services and herself an adoptive mother, who commented on her contemporaries' view of adoptive parenting, "No one who is not willfully deluded would maintain that the experiences of adoption can take the place of the actual bearing and rearing of an own child."[92]

The traditional view of adoptive parenting received empirical support from a Princeton University study of 6,000 adoptive, step, and foster mothers in the United States and South Africa from 1968-1985 indicated that food expenditures in households with non-biological children (when controlled for income, household size, hours worked, age, etc.) were significantly less, causing the researchers to speculate that, instinctually, people are less interested in sustaining the genetic lines of others.[93] Moreover, the perception of similarities between adoptive parent and child appears important to successfully parenting. In relationships marked by sameness in likes, personality, and appearance, both adult adoptees and adoptive parents report being happier with the adoption.[94]

Nevertheless, there is evidence that adoptive relationships can form along other lines. A study evaluating the level of parental investment indicates strength in adoptive families, suggesting that parents who adopt invest more time in their children than other parents and concludes, "...adoptive parents enrich their children's lives to compensate for the lack of biological ties and the extra challenges of adoption."[95]

Beyond the foundational issues, the unique questions posed for adoptive parents are varied. They include how to respond to stereotypes, answering questions about heritage, and how best to maintain connections with biological kin when in an open adoption.[96] One author suggests a common question adoptive parents have is: "Will we love the child even though he/she is not our biological child?"[97] A specific concern for many parents is accommodating an adoptee in the classroom.[98] Familiar lessons like "draw your family tree" or "trace your eye color back through your parents and grandparents to see where your genes come from" could be hurtful to children who were adopted and do not know this biological information. Numerous suggestions have been made to substitute new lessons, e.g., focusing on "family orchards."[99]

Adopting older children presents other parenting issues. Some children from foster care have histories of maltreatment, such as physical and psychological neglect, physical abuse, and sexual abuse, are at risk of developing psychiatric problems.[100][101] Such children are at risk of developing a disorganized attachment.[102][103][104] Studies by Cicchetti et al. (1990, 1995) found that 80% of abused and maltreated infants in their sample exhibited disorganized attachment styles.[105][106] Disorganized attachment is associated with a number of developmental problems, including dissociative symptoms,[107] as well as depressive, anxiety, and acting-out symptoms