Growing Up Adopted: Study Highlights Health, Happiness of Adopted Children

A recent report by the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services may put to rest many of the arguments or concerns U.S. citizens have about the impact of adoption on children.

The report, titled "Adoption USA," was compiled from data from the 2007 National Survey of Adoptive Parents – a federal survey of 2,000 families that adopted children from foster care, internationally or through private domestic adoption.

The report found that 85 percent of adoptive children are in excellent or very good health, and that adoptive children are more likely to have health insurance than children in the general population. Adopted children also were less likely to live in households below the poverty threshold.

The report also found that adopted children benefit in other ways than children in the general population:

·         Adopted children were more likely to be read to every day as a young child (68 percent of adopted children vs. 48 percent of children in the general population).
·         Adopted children were more likely to be sung or told stories to every day as a young child (73 percent  of adopted children vs. 59 percent of children in the general population).
·         Adopted children are more likely to participate in extracurricular activities as school-age children (85 percent of adopted children vs. 81 percent of children in the general population).
·         More than half of adopted children were reported to have excellent or very good performance in reading, language arts and math.

With regards to the type of adoption, the report found that children are adopted nearly equally from the three types of adoption: 37 percent of adopted children were adopted from foster care, 38 percent were adopted through a private domestic adoption and 25 percent were adopted internationally.

Findings also included statistics regarding the openness of adoption, showing a strong tend supporting notions that adoptive families are increasingly becoming more comfortable with more open adoptions. Sixty-seven percent of respondents reported having a pre-adoption agreement regarding openness (such as visits or phone calls with the birth family) and 68 percent of adoptive families reported post-adoption contact with the birth family (such as an exchange of letters, e-mails or visits after the adoptive placement). Furthermore, the study found that nearly all – 97 percent – of adopted children ages 5 and older know they were adopted.

To read the full version of "Adoption USA," visit http://aspe.hhs.gov/hsp/09/NSAP/chartbook/.





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