This paper reports on associations observed between Adult Attachment Interviews (AAIs) obtained from adoptive mothers, and emotional themes appearing in doll play narratives obtained from their recently adopted children. The children, aged 4 -8 years, carried into their adoptive placements a history of consistently serious maltreatment, including neglect and abuse. Results reveal strong and significant influences of maternal state of mind regarding attachment upon their adopted children's storycompletions. Mothers whose AAIs were judged insecure (either dismissing or preoccupied) were likely to have adopted children who, three months after placement, provided story-completions with higher levels of aggressiveness as compared to the stories provided by children adopted by mothers with secure-autonomous AAIs. Children whose adoptive mothers provided AAIs indicative of unresolved (as opposed to resolved) mourning regarding past loss or trauma provided story completions with higher scores for emotional themes such as 'parent appearing child-like' and 'throwing out or throwing away'. Results also include a qualitative section that provides narrative excerpts of maternal AAIs and children's story-completions. Discussion concerns the contribution these findings make to the literature on intergenerational transmission of attachment patterns, and the implications these findings have for child clinical work and social policy.

Children who develop their 'internal working models' of attachment in situations of neglect or abuse, carry the effects of these models into new placements if they are then adopted or fostered. This article reports on the assessment of these effects using the story stem technique, which provides children with a way of displaying their expectations and perceptions of attachment figures using both verbal and non-verbal means of representation. An outline of the story stem assessment technique is given, and the 'Little Pig' stems and a summary of the rating system are presented. The article then reports preliminary findings from a larger ongoing research project, comparing themes in the stories of previously maltreated children placed for adoption with those of a group of children adopted in the first year of life, and using the technique to track changes in the children's attachment representations, and some other aspects of their 'internal working models', over the first year of placement in their new families.

The study reported here by Jeanne Kaniuk, Miriam Steele and Jill Hodges explored the development of attachments between a group of 63 children aged four to eight years at placement, all of whom had a history of separations and neglect or abuse. The 63 children and their adopters (42 families) were followed up for two years after placement. They were compared with a group of 48 children who had been adopted as infants (under 12 months of age) but who were of similar age to the research sample at the time of the study. Measures used included measures of the children's attachments and psychological development and of the adopters' attachment status and experience as parents. Uniquely in the field of adoption, this project has included measures of attachment that look below the surface to explore the inner worlds of both the children and the adopters. The children's schools were also contacted for a report on their progress.

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