Ruth G Mcroy
Dados Biográficos
| ID | 95824 |
|---|---|
| NOME | Ruth G Mcroy |
| PRENOMES | Ruth G |
| SOBRENOME | Mcroy |
| ASSINATURA | MCROY R G |
| AFILIAÇÕES | The University of Texas at Austin |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-6313-1698 |
| VERIFICADO | Sim |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 45 |
| TOTAL DE CITAÇÕES | 226 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 45 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 0 |
| PRIMEIRO ANO DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 1984 |
| ANO MAIS RECENTE DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 2021 |
| ÍNDICE H | 9 |
University and Community Agency Research Partnerships
Community-partnered research presents unique opportunities for personal and professional development among social work practitioners, researchers, and students. It is a vehicle for promoting social work values, generating and sharing knowledge, and connecting research to practice. Findings from these types of partnerships can be instructive for those interested in pursuing community-partnered research to improve practice. In this article, we desc…
Tech‐Mediated and Traditional Communication Modes in Adult Adoptees' Contact With Birth Parents
Family professionals should consider the unique roles traditional and tech-mediated modes of communication may play when supporting adult adoptees in contact with birth relatives
Without a Paddle
The growing immigrant population in the United States consists of school-aged children who are in need of educational opportunities available through the country’s existing educational system. Education, a basic human right, is mandated through compulsory education laws in the United States so that all children can learn, grow, and be prepared for the future. However, immigrant children and families face a challenge early on, with the enrollment …
Socializing Children About Family Structure
Despite increasing numbers of lesbian- and gay- (LG-) parent families, little research on LG-adoptive-parent families has examined parental beliefs and perceptions related to discussing their sexual minority status with their children. This study assessed 266 LG adoptive parents (160 lesbian mothers, 106 gay fathers) from the Modern Adoptive Families (MAF) study, a nationwide survey (2012–2013) of adoptive parents' pre- and post-placement experie…
Rethinking practice with multicultural communities
Social work recognizes “the power and possibility of story” (Burack-Weiss, Lawrence, & Mijangos, 2017). We listen to our clients’ personal narratives and establish relationships with them. But the
Ethical Considerations in Adoption Research
Adoption research often includes multiple members of the adoption network, each of whom has distinctive perspectives. Participants may include adopted individuals and their siblings as well as adoptive parents, birth parents, and adoption professionals. Due to these multiple informants and the sensitivity of the topics explored in adoption research, researchers encounter several unique ethical concerns when working with populations impacted by ad…
Beyond the Childhood Years
Patchwork of promises
In 2014, the United States saw a greater than 50% increase in the number of unaccompanied children from Mexico and Central America arriving at the U.S./Mexico border, and unaccompanied children continue to migrate to the United States in consistent numbers. The dramatic increase of 2014 exposed gaps in policies aimed at supporting unaccompanied children as they await legal adjudication. This paper begins with a historic review of immigration poli…
Birth Mothers Now Birth Grandmothers
Despite growing trends in openness between birth and adoptive families, little is known about what happens when adopted children become parents and birth mothers become birth grandmothers. These new and unique relationships between birth mothers and their grandchildren were examined through intensive case study analyses of in-depth interviews with birth mothers who placed infants for adoption more than 25 years ago (N = 11). Findings revealed enj…
Adoptive Mothers' and Fathers' Psychological Distress
This study tests pathways to adoptive parents' psychological distress over time and then examines gender differences in psychological distress. Participants included 190 adoptive mothers and 190 adoptive fathers from the longitudinal Minnesota/Texas Adoption Research Project, a study of U.S. domestic infant adoptions. The majority of adoptive parents reported low psychological distress 10 to 20 years post-adoption. Some struggled throughout their…
Preparing Professional Degree Students to Tackle Grand Challenges
The Grand Challenges for Social Work Initiative (GCSWI) reflects the power and potential of social work to accelerate social innovations and resolve major social problems. The complexity of these societal problems mandates profession-wide entrepreneurial readiness to engage in transdisciplinary, interprofessional, and translational collaborations. The GCSWI galvanizes shifts in undergraduate, master’s, doctoral, and early career supports to equip…
Exploring Adoption-Specific Curricula in Undergraduate and Graduate Degree Programs
The systemic impact of adoption suggests the need to explore adoption-specific curricula in baccalaureate and graduate degree programs. Using a convenience sample, the present exploratory study collected data in two phases. Phase one included email requests for adoption syllabi to professional email lists and to identified faculty with adoption research and practice expertise. In phase two, 22 faculty members who responded by emailing syllabi wer…
Drivers of change
Regulating Commercial Global Surrogacy
Special Issue Introduction
Agency-Related Barriers Experienced by Families Seeking to Adopt From Foster Care
Although about 100,000 children in foster care await adoption, families approved to adopt encounter obstacles in the adoption process. This nationwide longitudinal study identified agency-related barriers faced by prospective adoptive parents. A pur-posively recruited sample of 300 families seeking to adopt from foster care completed an in-depth, semi-structured telephone interview and quarterly follow-up surveys until they either finalized a fos…
Youth Perspectives on Being Adopted from Foster Care by Lesbian and Gay Parents
This article presents findings from a qualitative study on the perspectives of youth who were adopted from the United States foster care system by lesbian and gay parents and includes focus group data from adopted persons and survey data from adoptive parents. This study fills a unique gap in the literature by hearing directly from the youth through focus groups. Findings indicated that children use a variety of strategies for sharing or not shar…
A Mixed-Methods Case Study of Parent Involvement in an Urban High School Serving Minority Students
Parental involvement in education has been associated with a number of positive outcomes for students. Using a mixed-methods approach, the authors examine how role construction and self-efficacy (psychological motivators), invitations (contextual motivators), and life contexts influence a parent’s decision to become involved within the context of an urban high school serving primarily Latino, African American, and immigrant children. Data collect…
Post-Adoption Support Groups
Married couples who adopt older children from foster care, especially children with special needs, can often face unique marital stressors. This article explores strategies for strengthening marriages using a sample of adoptive couples who participated in marriage enrichment events sponsored by an innovative state and federally funded Healthy Marriage Initiative project. The authors found that participation in marriage enrichment events aimed at …
Birth Mothers' Perspectives on Their Relationship With the Birth Father 12 to 20 Years After Adoption
This study investigates birth mothers' perspectives on their relationships with birth fathers after adoption placement. A total of 125 birth mothers were interviewed 12 to 20 years postplacement about the nature of their relationship with the birth father and their satisfaction with their contact with the birth father both at the time of placement and currently. These interviews were part of a larger longitudinal study of birthparents, adoptive p…
Transracial Adoption Policies and Practices
The over-representation of African American children placed in out-of-home care and in need of adoption continues to be a major problem in the United States. Many believed that the passage of the controversial Multiethnic Placement Act and subsequent Interethnic Provisions would address the problem by increasing the number of African American children adopted. However, the problem still remains years later. Ruth McRoy and Amy Griffin examine the …
Innovative Practice Approaches to Matching in Adoption
Matching a child to a family in adoption has often been seen as a professional yet subjective decision-making process. The recent emphasis on evidence-based practice in the field of social work and child welfare has led many adoption professionals to pursue more objective, innovative approaches to the matching process. This article provides an overview of 7 assessment tools and discusses the potential for their use as part of an innovative approa…
Impact of a Nida Research Development Program in a School of Social Work
Journal Article Impact of a NIDA Research Development Program in a School of Social Work Get access Carol M. Lewis, PhD, Carol M. Lewis, PhD associate director Center for Social Work Research Send correspondence regarding this article to Carol M. Lewis, School of Social Work, University of Texas at Austin, 1 University Station - D3510, Austin, TX 78712; e-mail: [email protected]. Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic …
Birth Mothers' Perceptions of Their Parented Children's Knowledge of and Involvement in Adoption
An examination of birth mothers' perceptions of the relationship between the children she is parenting and the children she placed for adoption offers unique insight into the life course of openness. In the present study, 94 birth mothers from the United States participated in a semi-structured interview, discussing their oldest parented children's knowledge of and experience with their siblings placed for adoption. Results show that 59 birth mot…
Many Faces of Openness in Adoption
Parents and adolescents (mean age, 15.7 years) from 177 adoptive families participating in the second wave of the Minnesota/Texas Adoption Research Project were interviewed about their post-adoption contact arrangements. The sample included families with no contact, stopped contact, contact without meetings, and contact with face-to-face meetings between the adolescent and birth mother. Openness arrangements were dynamic, and different openness a…
The Family Adoption Communication (FAC) Model
Presented is a theoretical model explaining how family communication about adoption evolves over time. Based on data from a national longitudinal study of the effects of openness in adoption (Grotevant & McRoy, 1998), the Family Adoption Communication (FAC) model describes the dynamic processes inherent in adoption-related communication and uses a contextual perspective that considers the developmental needs of children to explain the discrepanci…
Evolution and resolution
This article explores birthmothers' experiences of grief and loss over time across the continuum of openness in adoption. Data were collected by structured interview at two points in time: 4-12 years postplacement (169 birthmothers) and 12-20 years postplacement (127 birthmothers). At Wave 1 a majority of the birthmothers were experiencing moderate to high degrees of grief. However, by Wave 2 a similar majority reported feeling some or no feeling…
Many Faces of Openness in Adoption
Parents and adolescents (mean age, 15.7 years) from 177 adoptive families participating in the second wave of the Minnesota/Texas Adoption Research Project were interviewed about their post-adoption contact arrangements. The sample included families with no contact, stopped contact, contact without meetings, and contact with face-to-face meetings between the adolescent and birth mother. Openness arrangements were dynamic, and different openness a…
A Mixed-Methods Case Study of Parent Involvement in an Urban High School Serving Minority Students
Parental involvement in education has been associated with a number of positive outcomes for students. Using a mixed-methods approach, the authors examine how role construction and self-efficacy (psychological motivators), invitations (contextual motivators), and life contexts influence a parent’s decision to become involved within the context of an urban high school serving primarily Latino, African American, and immigrant children. Data collect…
Adolescent Search for Birthparents
The decision to search for birthparents is one that all adopted persons consider. The focus of this study is to describe, for a group of adopted adolescents, who chooses to search and who does not and to explore how search behavior is related to the functioning of the adolescents’adoptive families and adolescents’psychological adjustment. Participants in the study included 93 adolescents whose contact with birthparents ranged from no contact or i…
The Emergence of Psychosocial Engagement in Adopted Adolescents
Psychosocial engagement of adopted adolescents was examined as a function of longitudinal patterns of stability and change in parents’ perceptions of the compatibility of the child within the family.Psychosocial engagement involves the adolescent’s active use of his or her inner resources to interact positively with others in family, peer, and community contexts.Participants included 177 adoptive families who were interviewed when the target chil…
Adaptive Behavior in Adopted Children
This study examines potential links between early risk and problematic developmental outcomes in a sample of adopted children during middle childhood (mean age = 7. 8 years). No direct relation was found between prenatal, perinatal, or preplacement risk factors and problematic socioemotional adjustment. When 12 high-risk children and their families were studied more intensively, collaboration in relationships within the adoptive kinship network d…
Contact in Adoption
Contact in adoption is a complex issue that adoption professionals frequently negotiate. Today most adoption placements include an initial plan for contact that in many instances changes over time. By understanding contact as an issue that presents itself over the course of an adopted person's lifetime, the complexities it brings to the adoption experience can be seen. Gretchen Miller Wrobel, Harold D Grotevant, Jerica Berge, Tai Mendenhall and R…
Adopted Adolescents' Preoccupation With Adoption
This study examines the relationship between the intensity of adopted adolescents' thinking about their adoptions and their adoptive family relationships. Participants included 135 adopted adolescents involved in an ongoing study of openness in adoption. Adolescents who reported high levels of preoccupation with adoption reported greater alienation from their adoptive fathers than did adolescents who reported moderate or low levels of preoccupati…
The Impact of Openness on Adoption Agency Practices
This article reports the results of a longitudinal study of the changing openness-related practices of private U.S. adoption agencies. Staff from private adoption agencies were interviewed at three points in time, in 1987–89, 1993, and 1999, about their current practices and attitudes regarding openness in adoption and any changes that may have taken place since the previous interview. From 1993 to 1999 agencies continued a trend toward offering …
Post-Adoption Support Groups
Married couples who adopt older children from foster care, especially children with special needs, can often face unique marital stressors. This article explores strategies for strengthening marriages using a sample of adoptive couples who participated in marriage enrichment events sponsored by an innovative state and federally funded Healthy Marriage Initiative project. The authors found that participation in marriage enrichment events aimed at …
Without a Paddle
The growing immigrant population in the United States consists of school-aged children who are in need of educational opportunities available through the country’s existing educational system. Education, a basic human right, is mandated through compulsory education laws in the United States so that all children can learn, grow, and be prepared for the future. However, immigrant children and families face a challenge early on, with the enrollment …
Adolescent Sibling Narratives Regarding Contact in Adoption
Although it is common for adoptive families to have multiple adopted children with varying levels of birthfamily contact, research has not studied the effects of differing levels of contact status on the sibling dynamics within the adoptive family. This study examines the experiences of 58 non-biologically related adopted siblings (ages 13–18) who have varying levels of birthfamily contact. Deductive the matic analysis was conducted on interviews…
Changing Agency Practices Toward Openness in Adoption
The impact of openness in adoption on private adoption agencies' practices and services was examined. In 1987-89 and 1993 staff from private agencies participated in structured interviews concerning their current practices regarding openness and the services offered by the agency. Over time, agencies tended to offer a greater range of openness options. Agency personnel reported that client demand, changes in agency philosophy, and competition fro…
Value Dilemmas
Regulating Commercial Global Surrogacy
Transracial Adoption Policies and Practices
The over-representation of African American children placed in out-of-home care and in need of adoption continues to be a major problem in the United States. Many believed that the passage of the controversial Multiethnic Placement Act and subsequent Interethnic Provisions would address the problem by increasing the number of African American children adopted. However, the problem still remains years later. Ruth McRoy and Amy Griffin examine the …
Grief Resolution of Birthmothers in Confidential, Time-Limited Mediated, Ongoing Mediated, and Fully Disclosed Adoptions
This study examines grief resolution issues for 75 birthmothers who placed infants for adoption four to twelve years ago in confidential, time-limited mediated, ongoing mediated, or fully disclosed adoptions. Interview data from sets of birthmothers and adoptive families were analyzed. Birthmothers in each of the four adoption arrangements exhibited the continuum of grief resolution, from “very poor” to nearly “very good” resolution. However, bir…
American Experience and Research on Openness
Preparing Professional Degree Students to Tackle Grand Challenges
The Grand Challenges for Social Work Initiative (GCSWI) reflects the power and potential of social work to accelerate social innovations and resolve major social problems. The complexity of these societal problems mandates profession-wide entrepreneurial readiness to engage in transdisciplinary, interprofessional, and translational collaborations. The GCSWI galvanizes shifts in undergraduate, master’s, doctoral, and early career supports to equip…
Drivers of change
Agency-Related Barriers Experienced by Families Seeking to Adopt From Foster Care
Although about 100,000 children in foster care await adoption, families approved to adopt encounter obstacles in the adoption process. This nationwide longitudinal study identified agency-related barriers faced by prospective adoptive parents. A pur-posively recruited sample of 300 families seeking to adopt from foster care completed an in-depth, semi-structured telephone interview and quarterly follow-up surveys until they either finalized a fos…
Youth Perspectives on Being Adopted from Foster Care by Lesbian and Gay Parents
This article presents findings from a qualitative study on the perspectives of youth who were adopted from the United States foster care system by lesbian and gay parents and includes focus group data from adopted persons and survey data from adoptive parents. This study fills a unique gap in the literature by hearing directly from the youth through focus groups. Findings indicated that children use a variety of strategies for sharing or not shar…
Innovative Practice Approaches to Matching in Adoption
Matching a child to a family in adoption has often been seen as a professional yet subjective decision-making process. The recent emphasis on evidence-based practice in the field of social work and child welfare has led many adoption professionals to pursue more objective, innovative approaches to the matching process. This article provides an overview of 7 assessment tools and discusses the potential for their use as part of an innovative approa…
Birth Mothers' Perceptions of Their Parented Children's Knowledge of and Involvement in Adoption
An examination of birth mothers' perceptions of the relationship between the children she is parenting and the children she placed for adoption offers unique insight into the life course of openness. In the present study, 94 birth mothers from the United States participated in a semi-structured interview, discussing their oldest parented children's knowledge of and experience with their siblings placed for adoption. Results show that 59 birth mot…
Matching children with placements
Transracial and Inracial Adoptees
Social Welfare or Social Control? Some Historical Reflections on Regulating the Poor
Significance of Ethnic and Racial Identity in Inter-Country Adoption within the United States
American Experience and Research on Openness
The Minnesota/Texas Adoption Research Project
Grief Resolution of Birthmothers in Confidential, Time-Limited Mediated, Ongoing Mediated, and Fully Disclosed Adoptions
This study examines grief resolution issues for 75 birthmothers who placed infants for adoption four to twelve years ago in confidential, time-limited mediated, ongoing mediated, or fully disclosed adoptions. Interview data from sets of birthmothers and adoptive families were analyzed. Birthmothers in each of the four adoption arrangements exhibited the continuum of grief resolution, from “very poor” to nearly “very good” resolution. However, bir…
Changing Agency Practices Toward Openness in Adoption
The impact of openness in adoption on private adoption agencies' practices and services was examined. In 1987-89 and 1993 staff from private agencies participated in structured interviews concerning their current practices regarding openness and the services offered by the agency. Over time, agencies tended to offer a greater range of openness options. Agency personnel reported that client demand, changes in agency philosophy, and competition fro…
Adaptive Behavior in Adopted Children
This study examines potential links between early risk and problematic developmental outcomes in a sample of adopted children during middle childhood (mean age = 7. 8 years). No direct relation was found between prenatal, perinatal, or preplacement risk factors and problematic socioemotional adjustment. When 12 high-risk children and their families were studied more intensively, collaboration in relationships within the adoptive kinship network d…
The Emergence of Psychosocial Engagement in Adopted Adolescents
Psychosocial engagement of adopted adolescents was examined as a function of longitudinal patterns of stability and change in parents’ perceptions of the compatibility of the child within the family.Psychosocial engagement involves the adolescent’s active use of his or her inner resources to interact positively with others in family, peer, and community contexts.Participants included 177 adoptive families who were interviewed when the target chil…
The Center for Social Work Research at the University of Texas at Austin
The Center for Social Work Research (CSWR) in the School of Social Work at the University of Texas at Austin demonstrates how interdisciplinary research collaborations between faculty, social work practitioners, and administrators can enhance social work practice and policy development. With limited infrastructure funding since 1974, CSWR has operated with grant monies renewed through contracts with state agencies and foundations seeking program …
Adopted Adolescents' Preoccupation With Adoption
This study examines the relationship between the intensity of adopted adolescents' thinking about their adoptions and their adoptive family relationships. Participants included 135 adopted adolescents involved in an ongoing study of openness in adoption. Adolescents who reported high levels of preoccupation with adoption reported greater alienation from their adoptive fathers than did adolescents who reported moderate or low levels of preoccupati…
The Impact of Openness on Adoption Agency Practices
This article reports the results of a longitudinal study of the changing openness-related practices of private U.S. adoption agencies. Staff from private adoption agencies were interviewed at three points in time, in 1987–89, 1993, and 1999, about their current practices and attitudes regarding openness in adoption and any changes that may have taken place since the previous interview. From 1993 to 1999 agencies continued a trend toward offering …
Value Dilemmas
The Family Adoption Communication (FAC) Model
Presented is a theoretical model explaining how family communication about adoption evolves over time. Based on data from a national longitudinal study of the effects of openness in adoption (Grotevant & McRoy, 1998), the Family Adoption Communication (FAC) model describes the dynamic processes inherent in adoption-related communication and uses a contextual perspective that considers the developmental needs of children to explain the discrepanci…
Contact in Adoption
Contact in adoption is a complex issue that adoption professionals frequently negotiate. Today most adoption placements include an initial plan for contact that in many instances changes over time. By understanding contact as an issue that presents itself over the course of an adopted person's lifetime, the complexities it brings to the adoption experience can be seen. Gretchen Miller Wrobel, Harold D Grotevant, Jerica Berge, Tai Mendenhall and R…
Adolescent Search for Birthparents
The decision to search for birthparents is one that all adopted persons consider. The focus of this study is to describe, for a group of adopted adolescents, who chooses to search and who does not and to explore how search behavior is related to the functioning of the adolescents’adoptive families and adolescents’psychological adjustment. Participants in the study included 93 adolescents whose contact with birthparents ranged from no contact or i…
Adolescent Mothers in a Transitional Living Facility
Most of the research literature on attachment and adolescent transitions has addressed youth in family settings. This article explores these issues with a sample of 25 pregnant and parenting teens living in a transitional shelter. Using case records and interviewdata as well as results of standardized measures of depression, self-esteem, child abuse potential, and emotional autonomy, insights on relationships between adolescent mothers and their …
Adolescent Sibling Narratives Regarding Contact in Adoption
Although it is common for adoptive families to have multiple adopted children with varying levels of birthfamily contact, research has not studied the effects of differing levels of contact status on the sibling dynamics within the adoptive family. This study examines the experiences of 58 non-biologically related adopted siblings (ages 13–18) who have varying levels of birthfamily contact. Deductive the matic analysis was conducted on interviews…
Birth Mothers' Perceptions of Their Parented Children's Knowledge of and Involvement in Adoption
An examination of birth mothers' perceptions of the relationship between the children she is parenting and the children she placed for adoption offers unique insight into the life course of openness. In the present study, 94 birth mothers from the United States participated in a semi-structured interview, discussing their oldest parented children's knowledge of and experience with their siblings placed for adoption. Results show that 59 birth mot…
Many Faces of Openness in Adoption
Parents and adolescents (mean age, 15.7 years) from 177 adoptive families participating in the second wave of the Minnesota/Texas Adoption Research Project were interviewed about their post-adoption contact arrangements. The sample included families with no contact, stopped contact, contact without meetings, and contact with face-to-face meetings between the adolescent and birth mother. Openness arrangements were dynamic, and different openness a…
Evolution and resolution
This article explores birthmothers' experiences of grief and loss over time across the continuum of openness in adoption. Data were collected by structured interview at two points in time: 4-12 years postplacement (169 birthmothers) and 12-20 years postplacement (127 birthmothers). At Wave 1 a majority of the birthmothers were experiencing moderate to high degrees of grief. However, by Wave 2 a similar majority reported feeling some or no feeling…
Impact of a Nida Research Development Program in a School of Social Work
Journal Article Impact of a NIDA Research Development Program in a School of Social Work Get access Carol M. Lewis, PhD, Carol M. Lewis, PhD associate director Center for Social Work Research Send correspondence regarding this article to Carol M. Lewis, School of Social Work, University of Texas at Austin, 1 University Station - D3510, Austin, TX 78712; e-mail: [email protected]. Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic …
Innovative Practice Approaches to Matching in Adoption
Matching a child to a family in adoption has often been seen as a professional yet subjective decision-making process. The recent emphasis on evidence-based practice in the field of social work and child welfare has led many adoption professionals to pursue more objective, innovative approaches to the matching process. This article provides an overview of 7 assessment tools and discusses the potential for their use as part of an innovative approa…
Transracial Adoption Policies and Practices
The over-representation of African American children placed in out-of-home care and in need of adoption continues to be a major problem in the United States. Many believed that the passage of the controversial Multiethnic Placement Act and subsequent Interethnic Provisions would address the problem by increasing the number of African American children adopted. However, the problem still remains years later. Ruth McRoy and Amy Griffin examine the …
Psychology (34 obras) · Child Welfare and Adoption (33 obras) · Sociology (26 obras) · Social Psychology (22 obras) · Developmental psychology (20 obras) · Social Psychology (19 obras) · Political science (17 obras) · Family Dynamics and Relationships (14 obras) · Openness to experience (14 obras) · Medicine (13 obras)