Korean Adoptee Perspectives on Family and Family Coping During Hardship

• In Event: 34.079 - Roundtable Session 14
  In Roundtable Session: 34.079-16 - Exploring Various Perspectives Within the Asian Pacific American Educational Experience

Abstract

The rise in domestic and international adoptions in the U.S. has established the need for adoptee voices that identify the resources that effectively support them through adversity. This qualitative study investigated 8 Korean adoptee perspectives on family, and the role it plays in their coping. Findings from the study demonstrate that adoptees have a broad, inclusive, and flexible construction of family. They valued their parents’ consistent support, communication, listening, feedback, and referrals. Additionally, close friends and peer groups played important roles as people who were included in their construction of family. Peers were able to support their adoptee friends simply by being positive influences, reaching out, spending time with them, giving advice and providing verbal moral support.

Author

• Diane Sookyoung Lee, California State University - Sacramento