These research requests come from Sue Austin (University of Bristol) and Yewande Reece (University of Birmingham).
Separated Sisters and Brothers: a research study on adopted adults’ views of birth sibling relationships and post-adoption contact - Sue Austin, University of Bristol
Are you an adopted person who was separated from your birth siblings, when you were adopted from local authority care?
I am a social worker and a PhD research student at the University of Bristol and my research is looking at how children who were adopted, and are now adults, experience growing up in a different family to their birth siblings. I would like to understand more about any contact arrangements that took place with siblings and how you think about these relationships now.
I am particularly interested in hearing from people who were adopted after 1992, when the law changed, and there was more emphasis on supporting children to keep in contact with their siblings, if they became separated in local authority care.
If you are interested in knowing more about this study and you:
- Are currently aged 25 or over
- Were over the age of three when you went to live with your adoptive family
- Were separated from at least one birth sibling when you were adopted
- Were adopted in England
- And went to live with your adoptive family after the 1st April 1992
I will be very pleased to hear from you. The research will involve an interview, by remote video link or telephone, to talk about your experiences.
If you would like further details, please contact me by email at sue.austin@bristol.ac.uk and I will be very happy to provide further information, with no obligation for you to take part. Thank you.
Exploring the meaning of 'home' - from childhood to adulthood for transracial female adoptees - Yewande Reece, University of Birmingham
I hope you can help in relation to my dissertation - which seeks to explore the meaning of home, in childhood, to adulthood for transracial female adoptees.
My particular interest of study is the impact of ordinary home life on transracial adoptees who, in addition to adverse childhood experiences, are also susceptible to racism, status stigmatisation and stereotype casting.
There is a plethora of literature which predicts and examines the negative experiences of adoptees, and a paucity of academic literature which draws on positive statistics and outcomes for transracial adoptees. The adverse effects of childhood trauma are well-known and documented. However, I believe it is equally important to provide hope to transracial adoptees - that they can find positive representations of themselves through the first hand accounts of everyday role models of ethnic backgrounds and experiences.
My intended goal is to enhance prospective adopters' and government policy makers' understanding of the dyadic relationship between trauma and parenting in the purposeful prevention or limiting of adverse neurological development.
Everyday home experiences present opportunities to enrich areas of the brain, for example, the limbic system which plays an important role in stress reactivity, and the prefrontal cortex responsible for processes including cognitive behaviour, moderating social behaviours and decision making. The creativity of the parent is as important as the creativity of the child in harnessing and synergising the positive attributes of each towards emotional healing and growth.
I hope to listen to and capture the experiences of successful transracial adoptee women as a means of gaining an understanding of home factors which have determined their path to success. The definition of success is relative and contested. However, I have set very narrow criteria for success as I believe that people of Black, Asian and Minority Ethnicity have a more profound relationship with this word, in the pursuit of equal educational opportunities and economic viability.
I feel this word goes to the heart of inequality in the UK, when comparing opportunities for personal financial, health and emotional growth within these diverse demographics. In relation to the BAME minority, I do not see the word "success" in the popular context in which it is often attributed or presumed, but as an economically critical barometer of where ordinary everyday BAME protagonists are in having the agency and power to promote health, emotional wellbeing, education, economic wellbeing (sustainable financial standard of living) and status.
Albeit difficult, glass ceilings have been broken by the BAME community who have lived conventionally within birth families, and I am certain that adult transracial adoptee women, with their inherent gifts of survival and creativity, are also out there being successful, holding untold but profoundly important and influential stories, if known.
I intend to interview participants as part of my research. If you would like further details, please contact me by email at yer596@student.bham.ac.uk and I will be very happy to provide further information, with no obligation for you to take part. Thank you.
