No abstract

Kinship care is the preferred alternative for children who cannot remain with their birth family, maintaining birth family links and continuity in other parts of their life. However, kinship care has also been associated with risk factors including lack of support, difficult contact with biological parents, adverse childhood experiences for the child, carer stress and financial difficulties. Using routine data from a kinship care helpline service, this study employed a mixed-method analysis of the association between socioeconomic deprivation and risk factors reported by kinship carers and explored social capital in kinship families. Findings indicated common risk factors experienced by kinship families regardless of deprivation level. However, certain risk factors were reported more in areas of high or low socioeconomic deprivation. Mapping the social capital of kinship families indicated that kinship families connect more with relatives than other types of informal, semi-formal or formal support services. However, these relationships are often problematic. The most prominent obstacle to social capital growth in kinship carers was financial difficulties. Our findings suggest that kinship carers may use support services differentially according to deprivation level, and socioeconomic deprivation may influence building social capital in kinship families.

Kinship care is the first choice for out-of-home care in the United Kingdom. Family context is described as both a strength and a weakness of kinship care arrangements with limited research examining how kinship carers understand and experience their family dynamics; the focus of this study. Data were harvested from 106 interaction reports with 63 kinship carers who accessed a Kinship Care Helpline in Scotland over a 2-month period. Three themes and several subthemes were identified: balancing act; agency and control; changing families. Data showed that kinship carers were managing complex family dynamics organized around welfare of the child, in which carers had to facilitate contact with birth parents that were sometimes perceived as posing a risk to the child. Carers described having to manage their own feelings about birth parents' behaviour and its effect on children. The demands of meeting the child's needs on carer wellbeing were described as a balancing act, negatively impacted upon by limited control over decision-making. Kinship carers showed resilience in navigating complex, sometimes distressing family dynamics in their drive to provide a stable and positive environment for the child, compromised by ongoing exposure to threats and lack of control over decision-making.