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Youth and Family Perspectives

Supporting Youth Voices in Family Meetings: What the Research Says

“I liked the way people talked about me. They didn’t make me seem like an angel or a bad guy at the conference. They were neutral. They told the story the way it is but also talked about what I do well.”
— A youth describing his experience with Family Group Decision Making in an issues brief from the American Humane Association.

Social workers and teens often describe “having a voice” as essential for children in foster care. However, defining “voice” can be complicated, and it can be particularly challenging to determine what “having a voice” means in a family-teaming process.

Indeed, as practice experience illustrates and research is just beginning to document, involving youth in teaming is both a necessary and a demanding proposition. As teaming evaluation becomes more sophisticated, so does information about how young people experience teaming. Researchers are evaluating the extent to which children are involved in teaming; what determines whether youth feel more or less included; and how several determinants – the role of facilitators, the format of the meetings, the inclusion of family and other team members – affect permanence, foster care re-entry, and youth satisfaction with teaming.

As they work, practitioners and researchers are grappling with issues common to social work practice: to what degree do the personal and cultural backgrounds of youth, family, and professionals involved in teaming affect their ideas about expressing their views or being part of the teaming process? Should teams focus on the child or the whole family? What forms of facilitation best addresses power differentials that exist between professionals and family members, adults and children?

Some studies in the United States and abroad are presenting thought-provoking research on the subject. Some examples include:

• Writing for American Humane, Dawson and Yancey describe the results of Family Group Conferencing from the youth perspective, inlcuding recommendations for improving youth participation and quotes about the benefits and drawbacks of team meetings.
 
• Two researchers in Wales have published studies of children’s views on family meetings that describe the risks and benefits to children. Among their findings: Children need to feel they have an important place in the process and that their views are heard; family conferences can reduce power imbalances between professionals and family; family arguments during meetings make some children feel disempowered; and careful preparation for meetings is crucial.¹
• Another small study, based on Family Group Conferencing in Calgary, articulated that attendance is not equivalent to participation and that family members and professionals sometimes undermine children’s participation.²
• Does it improve family meetings to allow children to have advocates in meetings? European researcher Dalrymple explores the question and presents pros and cons of the practice.³

Of course, understanding youth participation in family meetings is related to youth involvement in child welfare more generally, whether that takes the form of a child being active in his or her own case planning or in advocating for improved child welfare practice, regulation, and legislation.

Learn More

• View the November 2007 Connections Count for more information on involving youth in case planning and advocacy.
• Visit the National Resource Center for Family-Centered Practice and Permanency Planning’s listing of resources and tools related to youth voice.

Footnotes

¹ Holland, S., & O’Neill, S. (2006). “We had to be there to make sure it was what we wanted”: Enabling children’s participation in family-decision making through the Family Group Conference. Childhood, 13, 91-110.

Holland, S., O’Neill, S., Scourfield, J., & Pithouse, A. (2004). Outcomes in family group conferences for children on the brink of care: A study of child and family participation: Final report. Cardiff, Wales: Cardiff University, School of Social Sciences.

² Sieppert, J., & Unrau, Y. (2003). Revisiting the Calgary project evaluation: A look at children’s participation in family group conferencing. Protecting Children, 18(1 & 2), 113–118.

³ Dalrymple, J. (2002). Family Group Conferences and youth advocacy: The participation of children and young people in family decision making. European Journal of Social Work, 5(3), 287-299.