Back and forth - Child welfare in the face of parenting in transitions
Project period
April 2024 – March 2027
Supervisors
- Primary supervisor: Ellen Syrstad, VID Specialized University
- Co-supervisor: Mari Dalen Herland, VID Specialized University
About the project
When child welfare services place a child in foster/institution care, it is important that child welfare workers ensures that parents maintain the relationship between parents and their children. This therefore means that parents have to parent at a distance, a situation that may pose challenges. These challenges not only affect the parents, but also the child and the child welfare professionals.
Parents may experience guilt emotions, sense of loss or failure due to their child being taken away and anxiety when they are reunited with the child. The child experience different social settings when they are moved into foster care and back home again after an extended period. Additionally, these challenges also affect child welfare professionals who must assist parents to deal with the challenging transitions while ensuring the best interest of the child.
The research will focus on two scenarios: (i) to be parents at a distance when the child welfare services takes care of the child and (ii) when the child returns home after being placed in foster/institutional care. Therefore, the research will take a qualitative approach and address the following:
- How parents experience transitions when their child enter and exit foster care.
- How CWS workers experiences and navigate their interactions/encounters with parents when their child enters and exist foster care.
- Explore how CWS workers assist/support parents dealing with the difficulties that may arise when their child is placed in and removed from foster care.
Background
Master of social work with families and children
Research group
Norwell