84 research outputs found
Criteria for the selection of foster families and monitoring of placements.: Comparative study of the application of the Casey Foster Applicant Inventory-Applicant Version (CFAI-A)
Based on a literature review, this article frames different stages of the foster care process, identifying a set of standardized measures in the American and Portuguese contexts which, if implemented, could contribute towards higher levels of foster success. The article continues with the presentation of a comparative study, based on the application of the Casey Foster Applicant Inventory-Applicant Version (CFAI-A) questionnaire, in the aforementioned contexts. Taking a comparative analyses of CFAI-A's psychometric characteristics in four different samples as a starting point, one discovered that despite the fact that the questionnaire was adapted to Portuguese reality, it kept the quality values presented on the American samples. It specifically shows significant values regarding reliability and validity. This questionnaire, which aims to assess the potential of foster families, also supports the technical staff's decision making process regarding the monitoring and support of foster families, while it also promotes a better decision in the placement process towards the child's integration and development
Attitudes and decision-making in the child protection system: a comparison of students and professionals
In the contexts of family neglect or maltreatment, the State intervenes by safeguarding the development and well-being of the child or young person in danger. In more severe situations, the intervention may lead to the child’s removal from the family. The Portuguese Law on the Protection of Children and Young People in Danger (Law 142/2015 of September 8th) favours the placement of the child in a family environment, especially for children up to the age of six.
Despite this, in Portugal, in 2015, 8 600 children were in out-of-home care, only 3.5% of which were placed in foster care, while the remaining children were in residential care. Therefore, one of the fundamental rights of the child – living in a family environment – is compromised in practice.
This study aims to understand the decision-making process of 200 higher education students in domains related to child protection, and those of 200 professionals who are responsible for providing case assessments and recommendations for intervention in the Portuguese child protection system.
Using the Child Welfare Attitudes Questionnaire (Davidson-Arad & Benbenishty, 2008, 2010), the study aimed to identify the participants’ attitudes regarding removal of at-risk children from home, reunification and optimal duration of alternative care, children’s and parents’ participation in the decision-making process, and assessment of foster care and residential care, with the purpose of promoting children’s development and well-being.
We concluded that both sets of participants (professionals and students) can be divided in two groups, one which is pro-removal and the other, which is less so. In comparison with students, professionals less often favour the removal of the child and more often defend reunification. There are no significant differences among participants regarding their opinion about the role of foster and residential care, and the participation of the child in the decision-making process. However, professionals tend to support parents’ participation in the decision-making process more than students do. Finally, we present some implications of our findings for the practice of child protection
Growing-up in Family – The Permanence in Foster Care
Foster care offers a life environment to the child withdrawal fromhis biological family, during
an undefined time period that can be prolonged, in the limit, until adulthood or independence.Astable family
environment allows the development of security and belonging feelings associated to the possibility of
maintaining the contacts with his biological family.
In most of the situations, child can and must remain with his foster parents, and the acknowledgement
of this parent role is a step that can contribute to avoid ambiguities and uncertainties that are prejudicial to
the systemand for the practices that itwill be configuring.Nevertheless, in Portugal, foster care is a temporary
charactermeasure,whose application depends on the predictability of the return of the child or young person
to the family of origin.
The purpose of this article is to, after a brief characterization of the Portuguese children and youth protection
system, analyze the foster care permanence between 2006 and 2011, based on the characterization
report of the situation of foster children and youth. Following is presented and discuss, the collected data
from a study developed in Porto district, including 289 foster children in May 2011, representing 52% of all
children in Portuguese foster care system. The results were achieved using a data acquisition form filled
with official information of each foster child, and 52 interviews with carers.
Among the principal results is to highlight the long lasting placements, the permanence of the child with
his first foster care family, and the global positive evaluation of the achieved results, thus we can identify
several challenges to the near future of the Portuguese foster care.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
The contact in foster car of children and young people: A current evaluation
No campo das mĂşltiplas interações que ocorrem no acolhimento familiar, destaca-se a relação entre a criança acolhida e a famĂlia biolĂłgica, pelo impacto que tem no desenvolvimento da criança. Esta relação gera um conjunto de ligações que pode proporcionar ou dificultar Ă criança a possibilidade de partilhar valores, experiĂŞncias e conselhos entre aqueles dois mundos. A manutenção das relações pessoais entre os pais e a criança acolhida Ă© um direito de ambos, exceto se contrariar o interesse superior da criança, já que o corte abrupto das relações estabelecidas interfere na organização dos vĂnculos futuros. O presente artigo resulta da investigação em curso, no distrito do Porto, intitulado «Contacto no acolhimento familiar: padrões, resultados e modelos de gestĂŁo», no âmbito de atuação do InEd, o Centro de Investigação e Inovação em Educação da Escola Superior de Educação do Instituto PolitĂ©cnico do Porto. Este estudo tem como objetivo analisar os resultados do contacto entre a criança em acolhimento familiar e a sua famĂlia de origem, bem como as causas da sua inexistĂŞncia ou cessação.
Os resultados preliminares evidenciam que a maioria das crianças e jovens tĂŞm contacto com a sua famĂlia de origem, ocorrendo em quase 50% dos casos na casa da famĂlia de acolhimento, mas nem sempre com a regularidade desejada. Apesar do impacto do contacto na criança ou jovem ser muito diversificado, a maioria manifesta reações emocionais e comportamentais positivas. Por fim, apresentam se implicações para a prática dos tĂ©cnicos envolvidos neste fenĂłmeno.Among the multiple interactions in foster care, the relationship between the foster child and the biological family is relevant because of the impact produced on the child’s development. The relationship leads to the development of a set of links that can provide or hinder the child’s possibility for sharing values, experiences and knowledge between those two worlds. The maintenance of personal relationships between parents and foster child is a common right, unless it is against the child’s best interests, since the abrupt rupture of established relationships interfere with the organization of future bonds. This article results of an ongoing process of research in district of Oporto, entitled «Contact in foster care: patterns, results and management models» within the scope of action of the InEd, the Center for Research and Innovation in Education, School of Education of the Polytechnic Institute of Porto. This study aims to analyze the results of the contact between the child in foster care and their family of origin as well as the causes of their absence or termination. Preliminary results indicate that the majority of children and young people have contact with their family of origin, occurring in almost 50 % of cases in the house of the foster family, but not always with the desired regularity. Although the impact of contact on the child or young person can be very diverse, the majority has shown positive behavioral and emotional reactions. Finally, it is presented implications for the practice of the technicians involved in this phenomenon
Decisão, risco e incerteza: retirada ou reunificação de crianças e jovens em perigo?
This study aims to better understand what influences and determines decisions
in contexts characterized by complexity and uncertainty, and contributes to the development
of recommendations for practice. Based on the work of Davidson-Arad and
Benbenishty (2008, 2010), we intended to understand how students from higher education,
in scientific areas related to professions involved in decision making processes of children
and young people at risk individual care plan, would decide in the presence of a specific case
with different scenarios. Participated in the study 200 university students from different regions
of Portugal. We used a factorial design (2Ă—2) that involved a questionnaire vignette
with four versions. The questionnaire describes the case of a child suspected of being a victim
of violence and requires the students to make a decision about the kind of intervention
that should be applied in that moment. In addition they must also decide, if the child
was removed from her home, whether or not the child should be reunited with the biological
family after two years. Among the key findings we highlight the fact that students recognized
the risk posed to the child as suffering significant physical and emotional harm.
Nevertheless, most decided in favour of an intervention with the biological family, avoiding
the removal of the child from their life context. However, in the case of a decision favouring
foster care, the majority of the students considered that the child should remain with
the foster family when they were asked to reassess the case after two years. It is noted, with
statistical significance, that the decision was influenced at first by the agreement or not of
the mother to withdrawal and secondly by the child’s desire to be reunited or not with the
birth family. We concluded that the development of professional evaluation criteria and
decision making should be addressed by including in the curriculum of higher education
programmes in the field of child protection, the study of the criteria for the withdrawal, the
conditions for the reunification and the advantages of involving the child and the biological
family in the intervention.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Development of a loop-mediated isothermal amplification assay for the rapid detection of Styphnolobium japonicum (L.) Schott as an adulterant of Ginkgo biloba (L.)
Species adulteration is a concern in herbal products, especially when plant substitutes of lower economic value replace valuable botanicals. Styphnolobium japonicum is well known as a potential adulterant of Ginkgo biloba, which is one of the most demanded medicinal plants due to its wide use in pharmaceuticals, food supplements, and traditional medicine. Despite bearing some resemblance to ginkgo's flavonol composition, S. japonicum lacks many of G. biloba's desired therapeutic properties. To prevent adulteration practices, it is crucial to implement rigorous quality control measures, including fast and simple diagnostic tools that can be used on-field. Purpose: This study aims to develop for the first time a species-specific loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) method for the fast identification of S. japonicum in ginkgo-containing products. Methods: A set of four specific primers (SjF3, SjB3, SjFIP, and SjBIP) and loop primers (SjLF and SjLB) were designed for a LAMP based assay using the 5.8S partial sequence and the internal transcribed spacer 2 of nuclear ribosomal DNA of S. japonicum. Results: The successful amplification of the LAMP assay was inspected through visual detection, with the highest intensity recorded at the optimal conditions set at 68 °C for 40 min. The primers showed high specificity and were able to accurately discriminate S. japonicum from G. biloba and 49 other species of medicinal plants. Furthermore, the proposed LAMP assay proved to be fast, selective, and highly sensitive, as demonstrated by the absolute and relative limits of detection, which were reached at 0.5 pg for S. japonicum DNA and 0.01 % S. japonicum in G. biloba, respectively. Conclusions: This novel approach allows easy identification and discrimination of S. japonicum as a potential adulterant of G. biloba, thus being a useful tool for quality control. Compared to chromatographic or PCR-based methods, the assay proved to be fast, sensitive and did not require expensive equipment, thus offering the possibly usage in field analysis.The authors are grateful to the Foundation for Science and Technology
(FCT, Portugal) for financial support through the project
“POIROT: novel methods and approaches for detecting the illegal
addition of Pharmaceutical drugs and bOtanIcal adulteRatiOn in planT
food supplements” (PTDC/SAU-PUB/3803/2021) and through national
funds FCT/MCTES (PIDDAC) to CIMO (UIDB/00690/2020 and UIDP/
00690/2020) and SusTEC (LA/P/0007/2020). M. Honrado is grateful to
FCT for PhD grant 2021.08119.BD financed by POPH-QREN (subsidised
by FSE and MCTES).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Crescer em famĂlia: a permanĂŞncia no Acolhimento Familiar.
O Acolhimento Familiar oferece um contexto de vida Ă criança retirada da sua famĂlia biolĂłgica, por um perĂodo de tempo indeterminado que se pode prolongar, no limite, atĂ© Ă maioridade ou independĂŞncia. Um contexto familiar estável permite desenvolver sentimentos de segurança e de permanĂŞncia associados Ă possibilidade de manutenção dos contactos com a sua famĂlia biolĂłgica.
O objetivo deste artigo é, após uma breve caracterização do sistema de proteção de crianças e jovens português, analisar a permanência no acolhimento familiar de 2006 a 2011, a partir dos relatórios de caracterização das crianças e jovens em situação de acolhimento. De seguida procedemos à apresentação e discussão de dados recolhidos num estudo desenvolvido no distrito do Porto, englobando as 289 crianças que se encontravam acolhidas em Maio de 2011, e que representavam 52% das colocações familiares de crianças em Portugal. Os resultados foram apurados com a aplicação de um formulário de recolha de dados e através da realização de 52 entrevistas a acolhedores.
Entre os resultados principais destacam-se os longos perĂodos de estadia, a permanĂŞncia da criança na famĂlia acolhedora inicial e a avaliação global positiva dos resultados obtidos, o que nos permite identificar um conjunto de desafios que se colocam no futuro imediato ao acolhimento familiar portuguĂŞs
Perceived barriers, drivers and enablers to becoming a foster family:An exploratory study in Portugal
Children and young people that need to be removed from their living environment should be preferably placed in a family care context, rather than in residential care homes. Given the scarcity of foster families in the child protection system, efforts to recruit new families may benefit from evidence about the representations, enablers, and barriers to become a foster family within community samples. The current qualitative study (N = 716, 79 % female, aged between 18 and 76 years old, Portugal) collected data from a set of free word association tasks and open questions about foster families. The results revealed mostly positive representations about foster families and their protective role for children in need (e.g., social appreciation of foster families), although some negative representations were also identified (e.g., ambivalence regarding the role of foster families). The main perceived drivers and enablers to become a foster family included the protective role of foster care (e.g., to promote child development), individual/family resources (e.g., economic resources), and other family factors (e.g., inability to have biological children). The main perceived barriers included the lack of individual and family resources (e.g., economic resources), individual and family constraints (e.g., emotional or health related factors), and constraints related with the foster care system (e.g., bureaucracy, difficulties regarding formal procedures). These findings provide inputs for further research on how to improve the recruitment and retention of new foster families.</p
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