| 1. |
- Almqvist, Anna-Lena, 1963-, et al.
(författare)
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Tensions and change in liminal spaces – Young people in Swedish out-of-home care
- 2024
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Ingår i: Children and youth services review. - : Elsevier Ltd. - 0190-7409 .- 1873-7765. ; 157
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The objective of this paper is to further the understanding of young people's experiences of out-of-home care (OHC). The focus will be on the tension between negative and positive experiences of OHC, refracted through the concept of liminality. The study is based on semi-structured interviews with 10 young people aged 15–22 (7 women, 3 men) with long-term contact with social services and psychiatric care. OHC can be experienced as a liminal space in both a negative and a positive sense. It is negative when perceived as containment rather than meaningful treatment. It can also be a negative experience when connected to fear, a lack of influence, and uncertainty in terms of being in between the social services and psychiatric care. It is positive when it is perceived as a turning point that enables positive change. It is then connected to feelings of meaningfulness, being respected, hope, and empowerment. The young people participating in the study also connect their experiences of OHC to a context of greater austerity in the welfare state. They reflect upon the benfits of OHC in terms of costs for society, but also the costs for the young person if the OHC is not perceived as meaningful support leading towards positive change. The participants have complex, interrelated needs and problems, and they also experience institutional gaps between psychiatric care and social services. It is important to overcome these gaps, so that young people are not located in ‘in-between spaces’ in terms of service provision.
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| 2. |
- Andersson, Tommy, et al.
(författare)
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Women and men sexually violated by closely related perpetrators over a lifespan : Prevalence, revictimization, and association to adverse childhood conditions and experiences
- 2020
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Ingår i: Children and youth services review. - : Elsevier. - 0190-7409 .- 1873-7765. ; 113
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background: Being sexually violated by a perpetrator to whom one has strong emotional and social ties may be exceedingly traumatic as it involves a serious betrayal and violation of basic trust.Objective: To examine the prevalence and revictimization of this type of sexual violence in childhood, adolescence, and adulthood and its covariance with adverse psychosocial conditions and experiences in childhood.Participants and setting: A representative sample of 10,337 Swedish women and men aged 18–74.Method: A combined online and postal survey. Attrition bias was adjusted for by a calibration and weighting procedure based on official register information. Logistic regression was applied to calculate odds ratios (OR) and adjusted odds ratios (AOR).Results: The results showed that 25% of the women and 7% of the men had been sexually violated by closely related perpetrators at some time in their life. Victimization in childhood generated an OR of 4.3 (p < .001) for revictimization in adulthood. Most psychosocial indicators of an adverse childhood situation were significantly linked (OR) to victimization of sexual violence, but insignificant when controlling for the influence of confounders (AOR). The importance of the total burden of psychosocial childhood adversity was illustrated in that 12% of women and 2% of men without indicators of an adverse childhood situation were sexually victimized in adulthood, while the corresponding figures for those reporting at least nine aspects of an adverse childhood situation were 47% and 15%, respectively.Conclusion: The importance of integrating sexual victimization into a holistic psychosocial context in prevention and treatment was emphasized.
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| 3. |
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| 4. |
- Artamonova, A., et al.
(författare)
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Time and context shaping the transition from out-of-home care to adulthood in Portugal
- 2020
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Ingår i: Children and Youth Services Review. - : Elsevier BV. - 0190-7409. ; 115
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The difficulties that modern care leavers face on the way to independence are the focus of many studies. The present research illustrates how time and context - operationalised through belonging to different generations, from the previous century to today - has shaped care leavers' pathways to adulthood in Portugal. To trace these pathways, ten care leavers were selected based on purposeful sampling and snowball methods. To reveal the factors that indicate care leavers' better life outcomes, interviews with seven experts working with this vulnerable population group were organised. The pathways of male informants look "normal", even thriving, when compared with the trajectories of the general population of Portugal in the second half of the 20th century, while the experiences of female care leavers sound somewhat traumatising. The timing and sequence of the young cohorts' transition to adulthood events does not look aberrant compared to the general population. The various factors that determine a care leaver's better life outcomes emerged as access to the tangible and intangible resources needed to generate human and social capital, and personal agency. Care leavers from older cohorts were empowered by means of education and the support of former residents of out-of-home care institutions. Women from older cohorts could receive education but, due to the social context, they were not expected to build careers. The educational opportunities given to them were very basic and did not afford them the confidence to deal with adversity. Care leavers from younger cohorts seem to lose the advantage of competitive education and the sense of belonging to a large and powerful childcare institution due to the democratisation of the education system and de-institutionalisation of residential care in the country. However, they can stay in care longer, gain practical skills for independent living and benefit from the personalised support of professionals to deal with adversity.
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| 5. |
- Axford, Nick, et al.
(författare)
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The effectiveness of a therapeutic parenting program for children aged 6–11 years with behavioral or emotional difficulties: Results from a randomized controlled trial
- 2020
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Ingår i: Children and youth services review. - : Elsevier BV. - 0190-7409 .- 1873-7765. ; 117
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- ObjectiveThe aim of the study was to evaluate the implementation and effectiveness of a therapeutic parenting program that targets parents of children aged 6 to 11 years identified as having behavioral and emotional difficulties. The intervention comprises two parts, delivered sequentially: a 10–12-week group-based program for all parents, and one-to-one sessions for up to 12 weeks with selected parents from the group-based element.Methods/DesignIn a randomized controlled trial, 264 participants were allocated to the Inspiring Futures program (intervention) or services as usual (control) arms with follow-up assessments at 16 (post-group program) and 32 (post-one-to-one sessions) weeks. The primary outcome was the parent-rated Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) Total Difficulties score at 32 weeks. Secondary outcomes included parent-rated SDQ subscales, parent coping strategies, empathy in parenting and parenting skills.ResultsAll 264 participants were included in outcome analyses. There was no statistically significant effect on SDQ Total Difficulties (standardized mean difference: −0.07; 95% CI: −0.30 to 0.16; p = 0.54). There were no sub-group effects. Only 1 of 40 comparisons between the trial arms for secondary outcomes across both follow-ups was statistically significant at the 5% level. The mean number of group sessions attended by intervention arm participants was 6.1 (out of 10 to 12) and only 1 in 20 intervention arm participants received one-to-one support. Independent observation indicated scope to improve fidelity in terms of adherence, quality and participant responsiveness.ConclusionsThe intervention is not more effective than services as usual at improving targeted outcomes. This may be related, in part, to implementation issues but arguably more to the inability of a non-behavioral intervention to improve caregiving adequately, particularly when it is not targeted at new parents who have experienced trauma or deprivation early in life or subsequently.
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| 6. |
- Bengtsson, Mattias, et al.
(författare)
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Transitional patterns when leaving care – Care leavers’ agency in a longitudinal perspective
- 2020
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Ingår i: Children and youth services review. - : Elsevier. - 0190-7409 .- 1873-7765. ; 118
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Based on three waves of semi-structured interviews, this longitudinal qualitative study aims to understand the transition from out-of-home care (OHC; foster care, residential care) to independent adulthood, for a group of Swedish care leavers aged 16–20 years (n = 14). What are the main patterns in their transition process? How is agency reflected in these processes? The first interview (T1) was conducted when they were all still in OHC but on the verge of leaving, the second (T2) when the majority had left care and the third (T3) when they had been out for some time. Average time from T1 to T3 was 21 months, ranging from 17 to 28 months. By directed content analysis and an abductive approach, three transitional patterns were identified: From care to societal insiders, From care to societal outsiders and From care to societal in-betweeners. These patterns were connected to different dimensions of agency. Agency with long-term goals was shown to be connected to a stable transition from care, facilitating the emerging identification as independent “insiders” of society. Agency oriented towards the short term instead seemed to be connected to unstable transitions with a growing perception of being left as “outsiders” of society. Shuttling between those agentic positions, trying to apply long-term agency but experiencing the need for instant and pragmatic decisions, implied a halted transition “in-between” OHC and independent adulthood.
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| 7. |
- Bjereld, Ylva, 1984-, et al.
(författare)
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Measuring the prevalence of peer bullying victimization : Review of studies from Sweden during 1993–2017
- 2020
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Ingår i: Children and youth services review. - : Elsevier. - 0190-7409 .- 1873-7765. ; 119
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Forskningsöversikt (refereegranskat)abstract
- Research into the prevalence of bullying is important to enable the correct allocation of resources to prevent and end bullying. One problem when gathering knowledge in how prevalent bullying is, is the considerable variation in percentage points in research studies. The aim of this study was to analyze how the estimated prevalence in Swedish national population-based studies of peer bullying victimization is related to how it is defined and measured.The analysis focused on national population-based studies in Sweden, in order to ensure that the sampling and cultural aspects of data collection were similar throughout the period. Data came from three sources: 1) a scoping review of peer bullying victimization in Sweden, 2) reports from Swedish government agencies and non-government organizations that were not included in the scoping review, and 3) data from the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) Sweden 1993–2017 study.The results showed that although the estimated levels of bullying victimization depend on the measurement method, they all followed a similar pattern over time with a higher prevalence of bullying in recent years. The study raised conceptual inconsistencies between bullying, peer aggression, and peer victimization, which are further discussed in relation to prevalence and measurement.
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| 8. |
- Bromark, Kristina, et al.
(författare)
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Co-designing a dynamic tool to enhance participation for young people : A participatory design project with young service users and social workers
- 2023
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Ingår i: Children and youth services review. - : Elsevier. - 0190-7409 .- 1873-7765. ; 147
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- There is an emphasis on user participation in social work. The arguments derive from both a democratic and a consumerist approach, aiming on the one hand to equalize power between users and professionals, and on the other hand, for more efficient and legitimized services. However, research shows that there is a lack of knowledge about methods and conditions for realizing user participation in social services. In this exploratory study, grounded in participatory design, a set of four workshops took place, enabling young people, social workers and researchers to participate in the design process. The data were analysed with affinity analysis, a technique whereby the data are sorted with “I” labels, to stay close to the material. Also, written feedback and reflections from participants as well as oral feedback and reflections were generated, documented and integrated with the affinity analysis. The main findings concern how the participatory approach revealed tensions between the participants’ different perspectives on user participation, which in turn contributed to the shaping of a dynamic tool. The findings imply that the tool needed to be both “fair and square” to ensure equality for all young people, and dynamic and flexible to meet the uniqueness of each young person. Moreover, the tool needed to be both rich and contextualized to meet the need for information and participation throughout the transition process, and simple and accessible to meet the acute nature of many transitions as well as the overall time constraints within social work practice. The research process reached the level of contribution, with involvement in some but not all stages labelled as collaboration. The wide range of expertise involved in the design process provides a good basis for the tool to be able to address the need for increased user participation in social work practice.
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| 9. |
- Cameron, Claire, et al.
(författare)
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Security-first thinking and educational practices for young children in foster care in Sweden and England: A think piece
- 2020
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Ingår i: Children and Youth Services Review. - : Elsevier BV. - 0190-7409. ; 119
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- © 2020 While the education of looked after children has attracted considerable policy attention in Europe and North America, and globally the early education of preschool aged children is the subject of substantial investment, the early education of young children in foster care is neglected in both research and policy. This paper is a cross-national think piece to stimulate research and debate about young children in foster care. We present findings from two studies, one in England and one in Sweden, exploring foster carers’ views and practices with young children. We argue that there is a perceived tension, in foster care policy and practice, between education and emotional wellbeing such that young children's attachment relationships and sense of security is privileged over their engagement in educational practices. Attachment relationships are a necessary but insufficient condition for optimal development of fostered children.
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| 10. |
- Forsman, Hilma
(författare)
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Exploring educational pathways over the life course in children with out-of-home care experience : A multi-group path analysis
- 2020
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Ingår i: Children and youth services review. - : Elsevier BV. - 0190-7409 .- 1873-7765. ; 111
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- It is well-established that children with out-of-home care (OHC) experience perform poorly in the educational system. However, we know less about their educational pathways over the life course. Utilizing longitudinal prospective survey and register data with a follow-up to more than 60 years of age, this study compared educational outcomes over the life course between children with OHC experience and their same-aged peers. Moreover, by means of multi-group path analysis, the study explored differences in educational pathways. The results showed that the OHC group had lower school grades in sixth grade, in ninth grade as well as lower educational attainment in middle age. Cognitive ability and previous school performance had the largest associations with the outcomes in both groups. Yet, these predictors had significantly weaker influence in the OHC-group. Conversely, the birth family's attitude towards higher education was more important among children with OHC experience. Implications for policy and practice are discussed.
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