The study is aimed to examine manifestations of the attachment disorder behaviors in children with institutional experience living in substitute families, before and after the program of psychological support, in comparison with the behavior of children in families of biological parents depending on disability status and the degree of participation of substitute families in the program. The group of children in substitute families comprised 201 people (108 typical, 93 with disabilities, the age before the program - 4-10.5 years, after - 5-12 years), in biological families - 125 (65 typical, 60 with disabilities, age of assessment - 4.5-13.5 years). The support program consisted of 4 stages of activities directed to promote interaction between children and substitute caregivers and attachment development in children. The Attachment Disorder checklist was used in the longitudinal study with an interval of about 17 months to assess the negative manifestations of attachment behaviors. The results show that for groups of typical children and children with disabilities in substitute families the mean group values of the attachment behaviors' negative manifestations decrease after the support program in general and at the maximum and average, but not at the minimum degree of participation. After the program the mean group values of the negative manifestations in foster children is higher than in children in biological families, both in the group of typical children (for the total score and all areas) and children with disabilities (for the total score, in the social and emotional areas); the differences between children in substitute and biological families reduce with the increase of participation in the program. The results are discussed from the perspective of theoretical and empirical research data on effects of interaction and attachment based intervention programs on the behavior of children with institutional experience.

Translated title of the contributionThe role of the programme of psychological support in attachment disorder behavior among children in substitute families
Original languageRussian
Pages (from-to)53-63
Number of pages11
JournalPsikhologicheskii Zhurnal
Volume40
Issue number3
DOIs
StatePublished - 1 Jun 2019

    Research areas

  • Attachment behavior, Children, Institutional experience, Psychological support program, Substitute family, Typical and disabled, institutional experience, children, substitute family, typical and disabled, attachment behavior, psychological support program

    Scopus subject areas

  • Psychology(all)

ID: 47444214