Foster Youth’s Resilience and Wellbeing During Placement Changes

Youth in out-of-home care are at high risk of experiencing poor health and wellbeing, due to a combination of experiences before and during out-of-home care. Notwithstanding, numerous youth in out-of-home care utilize their personal abilities and characteristics of the environment to achieve positive outcomes. Despite the importance of resilience, there is limited understanding of how it is affected by child welfare characteristics, as well as the role it plays in shaping youth's perceived health and wellbeing. The purpose of this study was to analyze the relations among resilience, child welfare characteristics (i.e., amount of time in care, placement type, number of previous placement changes, and reason for home removal) and wellbeing (e.g., global health, quality of life, general mental health) for youth in out-of-home care. Youth were recruited from a foster care clinic at a large pediatric academic medical center, were in out-of-home care at the time they completed study activities, and were between 8 and 21 years of age. Resilience was measured in two domains: personal (adaptive intrapersonal/interpersonal characteristics) and caregiver (adaptive relationship characteristics between youth and primary caretaker). Results indicate that placement in family-based settings, youth reports of sadness, and other health and wellbeing indicators were associated with higher resilience in some domains, but no one domain was universally associated with all child welfare or wellbeing indicators. The results suggest that the relations between resilience and wellbeing are complex and may be multidimensional in the context of out-of-home care. This study adds to literature indicating the importance of supporting youth in out-of-home care, beginning early in placement, to ensure they can achieve the best outcomes following exposure to maltreatment and other adversity.