Test of a Sibling Intervention for Improving Self-Efficacy Among Youth in Foster Care

Background and Purpose: Self-efficacy (SE) is an essential resiliency-promoting factor for youth in foster care (Deci & Ryan, 2000), and youth SE enhancement interventions have been shown to contribute to educational wellbeing (Geenan et al., 2013). However, SE interventions in child welfare have not employed a sibling lens, despite the fact that a majority of foster youth have one or more siblings in care and siblings may serve as essential conduits for social support and psychological development (East & Khoo, 2005; Shlonsky et al., 2005). Supporting Siblings in Foster Care (SIBS-FC)(McBeath et al., 2014) is a NIMH-funded manualized intervention designed for preadolescent and adolescents siblings in care. The intervention sought to improve sibling communication, cooperation, planning, and problem solving through 8 skill-building sessions and 4 community activities; a key intervention outcome was SE. This study examined treatment effects for older and younger sibling outcomes of SE over the 18-month study period.

 

Methods: 328 siblings (164 dyads) in foster care were universally recruited from Oregon Department of Human Services, and sibling pairs were randomly assigned to participate in the SIBS-FC intervention or receive community-as-usual services. At baseline, the mean age for older and younger siblings was 13.1 (SD=1.4) and 10.7 years (SD=1.75), respectively. 56% of youth lived in non-relative foster care, and had been living with their caregiver for over 2 years. Moreover, about 60% of youth were non-White. The outcome measures were the Self-Efficacy Questionnaire for Children (SEQ-C; Muris, 2001) scales. SEQ-C is a 24-item measure with 3 subscales: academic SE (α=0.85), social SE (α=0.71), and emotional SE (α=0.83). Items were rated on a 5-point Likert scale. Data were gathered from youth at 0, 6, 12, and 18 months. Based on an intent-to-treat design and taking into consideration repeated measurement of the outcome and clustering of youth within the sibling dyad, 3-level hierarchical linear models were conducted to examine the impact of the intervention on SE over time controlling for age, gender, race, and living situation (together/apart) and sibling position (older/younger).

 

Results: Descriptively, average scales scores hovered around 4 over time (Baseline Means: ASE=3.87, SSE=4.01, and ESE=3.96) with academic SE consistently with lowest averages. HLM analyses revealed significant improvements in SE for youth in the sibling intervention. Over the 18-month period, the sibling intervention was significantly and positively associated with social SE (t=2.18, p<.05) and academic SE (t=1.98, p<.05). Age was inversely related to academic SE (p<.01); and living apart was inversely related to social SE (p<.10).

Conclusions and Implications: Given the promising intervention estimates in regards to social and academic SE, future research may seek to examine the suitability of sibling-focused psychosocial interventions for other foster youth, and test whether these interventions impact educational and social wellbeing outcomes. Since foster youth often struggle academically and in integrating into new social settings, and as child welfare legislation requires agencies to address foster youth’s educational and social wellbeing (Gustavsson & MacEachron, 2012), psychosocial sibling interventions may be a promising approach to assist with these efforts.