Family-centred residential care: the new reality?

This paper considers therapeutic approaches to residential care with specific attention to the question of family involvement. It builds on a body of literature indicating the potential of residential care as a positive intervention for young people, and examines the contention that – even when family problems contribute to a young person's accommodation in residential care – family involvement could improve long-term outcomes. The literature reviewed indicates that family involvement is indeed important. Mixed research findings reflect the diversity of approaches to family-centred practice, but there is evidence of benefits in relation to a range of child outcomes. However, the literature also shows that family-centred residential care is not easy to achieve. More than parent–child contact, it entails genuine involvement of parents, in decision-making and in children's daily lives. Professionals – including social workers and residential care workers – must not only be concerned with the care and development of the child, but also with the role of the parent in their child's development, understood within an ecological perspective.