An Exploratory Study on Investigation and Assessment of Adoption Family : Social Workers' Perspective

• Main Authors: Yen, Chihhsiang, 嚴之翔
• Other Authors: Liu, Chuli
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2011
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/18277211377873745884

碩士 === 東海大學 === 社會工作學系 === 100 === In general, social workers in Taiwan have to visit and investigate every adoption case, before these children are adopted. This is not only a necessary legal process, but also called the court consigned adoption investigation. Among these cases, social workers in agency must have to run related family investigations on the adoption applicants matched the adopted children before the courts consigned adoption investigation. Therefore, family investigation and assessment are important parts of children adoption service, its purpose is to ensure the adoption meet the best interests of the children. This study aims to explore the social workers’ experience in the investigation and assessment of adoption family. According to social workers’ perspective, the difficulties and their interpretation about the adoption assessment are able to be explored. Qualitative research method was utilized in this study. Semi-structured and in-depth interviews with seven Taiwanese social workers in children adoption were conducted. Findings of this research are as follows: 1. The experiences of participants who conducted assessment in adoption service through social service agencies The findings revealed that participants in this study reported that they had powers in their assessment , and they wanted to select applicants with better conditions. Also, participants in this study reported that their sensitivity and life experiences played important parts in their work. While applying attachment theory to assess, participants focused on current relationship experiences of applicants. Participants also reported difficulties of assessment, including they didn’t have appropriate amount of time to collect data comprehensively; every participant had his/her own preference, therefore, subjectivity was unavoidable in their assessment. Furthermore, participants in this study had to deal with adoption applicants’ emotional reaction when adoption application was rejected. 2. The experiences of participants who conducted assessment in court consigned adoption investigation The findings revealed that participants in this study focused on different issues when assessing different kinds of adoption. Participants in this study also had positive experiences from their work, which let them had the opportunity to learn and to be impressed. Participants reported difficulties of assessment, including they hardly obtain full information, leading to the outcome that it is difficult for them to make correct assessment completely. Also, that participants in this study considered they were lack of specific followed assessment principles. There were three suggestions provided to improve the situation. First of all, social workers should investigate adoption applicants more times and visit related others. Second, social workers should develop the sensitivity themselves to find the problem. Last, having the supervisory system is helpful for them to run their works. 3. Compare the experiences between participants who conducted assessment in adoption service and the court consigned adoption investigation Based on participants in this study, the similar experiences in these two places were participants’ sensitivity played important parts in their work and while applying attachment theory to assess, participants focused on current relationship experiences of applicants. Participants reported common difficulties of assessment were it was hard to get comprehensive information and they lacked consistent assessment in the present. The experiences of participants who conducted assessment in adoption service through social service agencies revealed that they had powers in their assessment , and they wanted to select applicants with better conditions. On the other hand, participants had to deal with adoption applicants’ emotional reaction when adoption application was rejected. The experiences of participants who conducted assessment in court consigned adoption investigation revealed that the complicated and variable assessment issues when assessing different kinds of adoptions. According to related research findings, this study not only had a discussion about previous literature, but also brought up suggestions to the practical work and future studies. In the end, research limitations and researcher’s self reflection were described. Key words：Adoption, Social Worker, Family Investigation, Assessment