OTVORENA POSVOJENJA IZ PERSPEKTIVE BUDUĆIH STRUČNJAKA
OPEN ADOPTIONS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF FUTURE EXPERTS

Summary/Abstract: The notion of openness in adoption encompasses not only communication but also structural openness, which is essentially nonexistent in the Republic of Croatia due to the existing legal regulations. Given the growing body of evidence provided by adoption experts around the world supporting open adoptions in certain situations and a number of local experts warning that insisting on closed adoptions is not always in the best interest of the child, the future may bring debates on legal changes on a national level necessary to enable increased openness. Since future generations of experts will (also) be included in these discussions, it is relevant to gain insight into their current perception of open adoptions and the factors underlying it. Therefore, this research aimed to examine the future experts’ attitudes towards open adoptions and their correlation with some internal (general adoption knowledge, interest in social welfare career) and external (contact with adoptive family members, hometown size) factors. The research included N = 119 future experts - undergraduate students of law (n = 35), social work (n = 28), and psychology (n = 56), who voluntarily completed an online survey designed for this study. Compared to psychology students, law and social work students exhibit more (though still insufficient) general adoption knowledge; however, this was not found to correlate with their attitudes. Regardless of their future profession, students displayed equal and neutral/slightly negative attitudes toward open adoptions regarding adoptive parents and their children. These attitudes were found to be unrelated to students’ (moderate) interest in a social welfare career, (scarce) personal contact with adoptive family members, or (predominantly urban) upbringing. The paper discusses the possible explanations of the obtained results, as well as the practical implications of the research related to the mandatory and lifelong education of experts and the improvement of adoption practices in the Republic of Croatia in general.

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