Wildeman Christopher, Emanuel Natalia
Department of Sociology, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, United States of America.
Department of Economics, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2014 Mar 26;9(3):e92785. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0092785. eCollection 2014.
Foster care placement is among the most tragic events a child can experience because it more often than not implies that a child has experienced or is at very high risk of experiencing abuse or neglect serious enough to warrant state intervention. Yet it is unclear how many children will experience foster care placement at some point between birth and age 18. Using synthetic cohort life tables and data from the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (AFCARS), we estimated how many U.S. children were placed in foster care between birth and age 18, finding support for three conclusions. First, up to 5.91% of all U.S. children were ever placed in foster care between their birth and age 18. Second, Native American (up to 15.44%) and Black (up to 11.53%) children were at far higher risk of placement. Foster care is thus quite common in the U.S., especially for historically disadvantaged racial/ethnic groups. Third, differences in foster care placement were minimal between the sexes, indicating that the high risks of foster care placement are shared almost equally by boys and girls.
寄养安置是儿童可能经历的最悲惨事件之一，因为这往往意味着儿童已经经历过或极有可能经历严重到足以促使国家干预的虐待或忽视。然而，尚不清楚有多少儿童在出生至18岁之间的某个时候会经历寄养安置。利用合成队列生命表以及收养和寄养分析与报告系统（AFCARS）的数据，我们估算了美国有多少儿童在出生至18岁之间被安置到寄养机构，得出了三个结论。第一，高达5.91%的美国儿童在出生至18岁之间曾被安置到寄养机构。第二，美国原住民儿童（高达15.44%）和黑人儿童（高达11.53%）被安置的风险要高得多。因此，寄养在美国相当普遍，尤其是对于历史上处于弱势的种族/族裔群体。第三，寄养安置在性别上的差异微乎其微，这表明男孩和女孩几乎同样面临着寄养安置的高风险。
