Disrupted adolescents in foster care: Their perspectives on placement breakdown

Placement breakdown has long been recognised as a serious problem in foster care, particularly for young people whose behaviour is seen as disruptive. This qualitative study conducted in South Australia examined recent unplanned placement changes (n=14) from the perspective of the young people involved Participants were eligible for the study if their social worker attributed their most recent placement move to carer request on the grounds of problem behaviour. There was a high level of agreement between participants and social workers on the problem behaviours, but a divergence of views on the reasons for the move. Participants' contextualising of their behaviour highlighted the complexity of the processes underlying placement disruption. The dominant theme to emerge from this study was the unhappiness of participants. Other problem areas noted were apparent lack of placement options, and exclusion of young people from placement decisions.