Pleegkinderen in conflictsituaties

Abstract

In this thesis, I study the child's perspective on conflicts with his or her parents. Family conflicts have often been studied with a focus on parent's ideas. My claim is that the closer we approach the perspective of the child, the more we understand the child's behavior in relation to conflicts. Therefore I focus on the 'inner logic' of children's behavior: what are their goals, concerns and emotions that motivate them to act in a certain way in everyday conflicts with their parents? The study reported here specifically focuses on the inner logic of foster children. Foster children often have a background of neglect and/or abuse, and several separations of important others. In this research I examine if the special background of foster children influences their inner logic and if differences between the inner logic of foster and birth children can be found. I answer the research questions within a constructivist theoretical framework. To interview the children I used three case descriptions, which were assumed to be recognizable, daily situations that children are likely to have experienced: a disciplinary situation, a crisis of confidence and a situation of false accusation. The results show that children don't 'just' react. Their actions have, from the child’s perspective, a logical motivation. And children don't always react in the same way: their behavior is related to situational-bound goals, concerns and emotions. Regarding the results of the comparison between foster and birth children: the disciplinary situation showed more differences than the other two situations. Differences between foster and birth children seem to be situational bound and related to the specific concerns that play a role within a particular conflict situation. At the same time the data indicate that foster children are more likely than birth children to withdraw themselves from conflict situations with their (foster) parents. I discuss the (practical) implications of these findings for parents, foster parents and future research.