Veerkragtigheid in die enkelouer-transrasgesin

[摘要] ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Families with a transracially adopted child are confronted with normal family crises, crisesdue to the adoption as well as challenges specific to a transracial family. When thistransracial family is a single-parent family, it could be assumed that the challenges the familyfaces will be even more. Consequently, the need developed to investigate characteristics andfamily patterns which contribute to family adaptation in crises in the single-parent familywhere a child from a different race than the parent has been adopted. The research question inthis study was: 'What are resilience factors in single-parent transracial families? Thestrength perspective formed the basis of this study and the theories of Walsh (2003) andMcCubbin and McCubbin (1996) provided the theoretical grounding. An explorative researchdesign was used to address the research question. Data were collected by means of semistructuredinterviews and conventional content analysis was performed to analyse the data byusing the Atlas.ti. computer program. Interviews were conducted with six white women whoadopted a child or children from a different race than themselves. These women were allsingle parents living in the Western Cape, South Africa. At the time of the study, the ages ofthese transracially adopted children ranged from three to 10 years. A biographicalquestionnaire and an in-depth interview with each participant were used to collect the data.The results indicated that an important resilience factor in the transracially adopted family isequipping the adopted child with specific skills to cope with crises that may result due tohis/her unique situation. Effective preparation of the adoptive mother before adoption, socialcontact and the support of the extended family were also found to be important resilience factors. Family routines, openness about the adoption and the utilisation of external resourceswere identified as important sources of resilience for the single-parent transracial family. Theresults of this study provide important information to the potential transracially adoptingparent to prepare him/herself for transracial adoption. The results of this study also provide important information to everyone involved in transracial adoption (for example the socialworker) in South-Africa.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University