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Home > Out-of-Home Care > Casework Practice in Out-of-Home Care > Casework Practice With Birth Families > Parent-Child Visits
Parent-Child Visits
While children are in out-of-home care placements, it is important to maintain connections with their birth families. Parent-child visits are a key strategy to accomplish this and to work toward reunification of the family. Resources include State and local examples.
Enhancing Parent-Child Interaction During Foster Care Visits: Experimental Assessment of an Intervention (PDF - 206 KB)
Haight, Mangelsdorf, Black, Szewczyk, Schoppe, Giorgio, Madrigal, & Tata (2002)
Twenty mothers of young children placed in foster care participated in an intervention designed to enhance parent-child interaction during visits.
Family/Child Visiting
National Resource Center for Family-Centered Practice and Permanency Planning
A collection of reports, curricula, and other resources relevant to visiting between children and birth families.
Family Visitation of Children and Youth in Foster Care (PDF - 357 KB)
National CASA Association & National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges (2006)
The Judge's Page Newsletter, June 2006
Highlights how courts can make appropriate and effective visitation decisions for children in foster care, their siblings and parents.
A Framework for Family Visiting for Children in Long-Term Foster Care
Mapp
Families in Society: The Journal of Contemporary Social Services, 83(2), 2002
View Abstract
Reviews existing literature to demonstrate the diverse, positive possibilities for children and develops a theoretical basis for a framework for family visiting.
Helping Grandchildren Stay in Contact With Parents (PDF - 83 KB)
University of Georgia, College of Family & Consumer Sciences (2003)
Guidelines for grandparents to help grandchildren maintain a relationship with their parents.
Improving the Lives of Children in Foster Care: The Impact of Supervised Visitation
National Council on Family Relations
Family Relations, 53(3), 2004
View Abstract
Results indicate that for families in which reunification is a goal, children who have more consistent and frequent contact with their birth parents have stronger attachments than children who have less contact.
Information Packet: Family and Child Visiting (PDF - 98 KB)
National Resource Center for Foster Care & Permanency Planning (2002)
Packet includes factsheets that address family and child visitation, including monitored, supervised, and therapeutic visitation.
In Whose Arms?: Using Relational Therapy in Supervised Family Visitation With Very Young Children in Foster Care
Lee & Stacks
Journal of Family Psychotherapy, 15(4), 2004
View Abstract
Describes a research program, Families in Transition (FIT), that uses court-ordered family visitation sessions as an opportunity for relational assessment and interventions.
Making Visits Better: The Perspectives of Parents, Foster Parents, and Child Welfare Workers (PDF - 72 KB)
Haight, Black, Mangelsdorf, & Giorgio (2001)
The importance of recognizing different expectations for visits and of coaching birth and foster parents about coping with children's responses.
Parent-Child Interaction During Foster Care Visits
Haight, Black, Workman, & Tata
Social Work, 46(4), 2001
View Abstract
Describes the variety of strategies mothers and young children use to negotiate the complexities of foster care visiting.
Parental Visiting, Conflicting Allegiances, and Emotional and Behavioral Problems Among Foster Children
Leathers
Family Relations, 52(1), 2003
View Abstract
Tested the hypothesis that frequent parental visiting is associated with foster children's conflicting allegiances to foster families and birth parents among a random sample of young adolescents in family foster care.
Parental Visiting and Family Reunification: Could Inclusive Practice Make a Difference?
Leathers
Child Welfare, 81(3), 2002
View Abstract
Examined whether parental involvement in foster children's lives while in placement is correlated with more frequent visiting and a greater likelihood of reunification.
Supervised Visitation
California Evidence-Based Clearinghouse for Child Welfare (2007)
Provides information on evidence-based supervised parent-child visitation programs.
Supervised Visitation: The Families and Their Experiences
Pearson & Thoennes
Family and Conciliation Courts Review, 38(1), 2000
View Abstract
Data were collected from case files and interviews with parents to provide a profile of families receiving supervised visitation services. Findings indicate that the visitation programs successfully serve a wide variety of families and garner high ratings of user satisfaction, but half of the families exit without formal closure.
Visiting Between Children in Care and Their Families: A Look at Current Policy (PDF - 264 KB)
National Resource Center for Foster Care & Permanency Planning (2003)
Reviews the foster care visitation policies of 37 States and summarizes the States' treatment of written visitation plans, participants in visits, frequency and location of visits, responsibilities and supervision, right of contact, and visiting activities.
Visits: Critical to the Well-Being and Permanency of Children and Youth in Care
McGowan (2005)
In Child Welfare for the Twenty-First Century: A Handbook of Practices, Policies, and Programs
View Abstract
Reviews research that supports frequent visits between children and youth in care and their parents, identifies obstacles to achieving optimum visit arrangements, and describes innovative visiting programs.
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State and local examples
Factors in Length of Foster Care: Worker Activities and Parent-Child Visitation
White, Albers, & Bitonti
Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare, 23(2), 1996
View Abstract
An investigation of factors potentially related to length of foster care placements in the Nevada Division of Child and Family Services, Las Vegas District Office.
Conducting Parent-Child Visits (PDF - 38 KB)
Sokolec, Budde, Poertner, & Derezotes (2001)
The University of Illinois Children and Family Research Center entered into a collaborative effort with the State to provide a bridge between child welfare research and practice, focusing on parental visits to children in foster care designed to maintain parent-child relationships in preparation for reunification.
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