Foster Care System: Trauma, Instability and Challenges

• Many children in foster care are forced to grow up quickly, due to trauma, instability, and lack of support.
• The emotional and social consequences that foster children face when they don’t achieve a stable family connection are significant.

Stimulus Connection

• Experiences of foster youth mirror the loss and identity struggles, that Ghansah describes when returning to her childhood home.
• Displacement can damage someone’s sense of self.
• Constant instability is emotionally and mentally damaging, especially for foster children without stable family connections.
• Idealized views of the “traditional family” can lead to harmful policies.
• Holding onto old-fashioned family ideals, lawmakers may ignore the real needs of children today.
• The foster care system's push for biological reunification, based on a romantic idea of family, may be doing more harm than good.

Context: Entry Into Foster Care

• Thousands of children enter foster care annually, due to neglect, abuse, or family crises, and many never find a permanent, stable home.
• A large number of foster youth are frequently moved from placement to placement, sometimes every few months.
• Transitions often happen without warning or explanation.
• Each move entails a new home, rules, schools, and people, leading to the loss of relationships.

Context: Instability and Social Skill Development

• Over one-third of foster youth experience three or more placement changes annually.
• Constant disruption hinders the ability to form lasting relationships or develop trust and security.
• Foster children lacking long-term parental warmth demonstrate significantly lower social skills than housed children.
• Without a steady, supportive home environment, foster youth struggle with emotional security and social relationships.

Research Question

• The central question is: How can the long-term social consequences be decreased for foster children who never achieve a stable family connection?

Findings: Emotional Impact/PTSD

• The foster care system can leave children more psychologically scarred than soldiers.
• Many foster youth experience repeated cycles of loss, uncertainty, and emotional abandonment, rather than healing.
• Foster children's trauma follows them and they are not trained or prepared for the emotional battles they face.
• The current foster care model should be questioned whether it is truly serving children or unintentionally setting them up for lifelong emotional harm.

Findings: Multiple Placement Consequences

• 70% of foster youth face multiple placement shifts.
• Multiple placement shifts are linked to Low academic achievement, Higher rates of homelessness, Higher drug and substance use, and Increased mental health care needs.
• Placement stability is critical for healthy development, emotional security, and long-term success.
• Youth without stable placements are more likely to face unemployment and involvement with the criminal justice system.
• These youth internalize that they are unwanted, unlovable, and undeserving of a stable, caring home.
• Such messaging can affect their ability to trust, form healthy relationships, and believe in themselves long into adulthood.

Findings: Real-World Example

• West Virginia’s House Bill 2027 aims to reduce unnecessary placement changes.
• Unnecessary placement changes cause trauma and slow development for foster children.

Solution

• Prioritize permanent, supportive relationships over temporary placements.
• Shift the system’s focus from biological reunification to long-term stability through kinship care, guardianship, or adoption.
• Programs like “permanency pacts” and trauma-informed care training for foster parents can help build emotional connections and provide consistency for youth.
• Without addressing these issues, foster children will age out of the system without the social and emotional tools they need to succeed.
• Reforms can break the cycle of instability and give foster youth a chance to belong and build a future.

Limitations

• The foster care system is deeply underfunded and often overwhelmed.
• There is a shortage of trained, trauma-informed foster parents to care for high-needs youth.
• Policy change is slow and reforming laws and attitudes around family reunification takes time and political will.
• Lack of Coordinated Support Services
• Overburdened Caseworkers

Implications

• Strengthened Family and Community Bonds
• Opportunity to Break the Cycle
• Increased Need for Comprehensive Support
• Strengthened Community Engagement
• Fostering a Sense of Belonging
• Without reforms, foster children will continue to age out of the system without the social and emotional tools needed to succeed.
• Consequences of instability ripple into society, contributing to higher rates of homelessness, incarceration, and mental illness.
• With reforms, the cycle of instability can be broken, offering foster youth a chance to belong and build a future.