The Emotional Context of Adopting an Orphan into a Foster Family

Foster parenting is examined as a multidimensional and multifactorial socio-psychological phe-nomenon described through a system of special parent-child relationships. The focus of the study was on the frus-tration of parental goals when raising an orphan and the emotional context as a result of overcoming frustration. The most typical types of reactions of foster parents to frustrating situations inherent in families with adopted chil-dren were analyzed. For this purpose, a modified method of S. Rosenzweig “Frustration Tolerance Test” and two author’s questionnaires recording the biographical characteristics of parents and the experience of fear before ac-cepting an orphan into the family were used. The study involved 52 parents: half of them had experience raising adopted children, and the other half raised only biological children. The results revealed a number of features of reactions to frustrating situations characteristic of all parenting, as well as unique features of foster parents.