Citation

Berlin M, Vinnerljung B, Hjern A. Child. Youth Serv. Rev. 2011; 33(12): 2489-2497.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2011, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.childyouth.2011.08.024

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

We used data from Swedish national registers for ten entire birth year cohorts (1972-1981) to examine psychosocial outcomes in young adulthood for youth that left long term foster care after age 17, comparing them with majority population peers, national adoptees and peers who had received in-home interventions before age 13. The population was followed in the registers from age 16 to 2005. Data were analyzed in Cox regression models.Youth who left long term foster care had six-to eleven fold sex and birth year adjusted excess risks for suicide attempts, substance abuse and serious criminality from age 20, and for public welfare dependency at age 25. Overrisks were considerably lower for the in-home intervention group and the national adoptees. Adjusting results for poor school performance in the final year in primary school (ages 15-16) reduced overrisks by 38-52% for care leavers from long term foster care.Irrespective of issues of causality, poor school performance seems to be a major risk factor for future psychosocial problems among youth who age out of long term foster care. The results suggest that promoting foster children's school performance should be given high priority by agencies. © 2011 Elsevier Ltd.

Language: en

Keywords

Education; Foster care; Cohort study; Out-of-home care; Longitudinal; School performance