Family, Friends, Partners, Professionals, and Other Adults in the Social Networks of Young People Aging out of Foster Care

Background: Over 20,000 young adults aged out of foster care in 2020 without a permanent home placement (Casey Foundation, 2022), and they often fare worse than their same aged peers in the general population across a range of outcomes (Courtney et al., 2011). Harnessing the power of youths’ social networks may be one avenue for enhancing wellbeing and other outcomes. Therefore, this study used a mixed methods social network approach to better understand network size, composition, and the types of network supports among youth aging out of care.

Methods: Young adults ages 18-25 (n=75) eligible for transition supports in Texas completed an interviewer-administered structured network survey in Ego-Web followed by a qualitative interview over zoom. Participants named up to 20 individuals who provided them support (material, emotional, informational, and/or mental health) in the past year. Follow-up questions assessed the role of network members, types of support, and more information about the relationship quality. Qualitative questions probed for additional information about these individuals. Descriptive and bivariate analyses, along with ego-network visualizations and qualitative transcript coding, were utilized to explore network member roles, the types of supports provided, and youth outcomes through an iterative analysis process.

Results: Participants had a mean age of 19.9 (SD=1.7) and were majority female (72%) and BIPOC (83%). They reported a mean of 6.4 years in foster care with 9.4 placements. Network size ranged from 3-20 (mean=8.9, SD=4.5). Overall, networks were composed of 36.8% family members, 6.7% former foster family members, 7.6% partners, 10.3% other supportive adults, 19.2% professionals, and 19.4% friends. Over 40% of networks had less than 5 individuals providing emotional support and 21.3% had 0-2 providing mental health support. About 40% of networks had under 3 members who provided material support while almost 80% of networks had at least one person providing informational support. About one-third of individuals provided all four support types (25% friends, 35% family, 73% intimate partners, 34% professionals, 45% foster family, and 26% other adults). Emotional support was provided by over 94% of friends and 83% of family members named in the networks. Almost 83% of intimate partners provided mental health support compared to 62% of professionals. Networks that included friends (n=50) were more likely to include more members that provided both emotional and mental health supports. Qualitative findings provided additional information on the key role of partners and youths’ preferences for supports from partners, friends and other supportive adults in their lives.

Implications: Our study highlights the importance of understanding the quality and types of social relationships in youth’s networks as they leave care. Though most networks included professionals, chosen social relationships, such as those with intimate partners, supportive adults and mentors, and friends, were more often those that provided youth with emotional and mental health support. Centering youths’ relational choices with a focus on supporting and enhancing these types of social supports rather than an emphasis on bolstering professionals in youth networks may offer young people with a longer-term support system that aligns with their values and needs.