Single Adoption
Exploring Child Welfare by Joan Shireman

Though single parents have raised children throughout history, professional adoption workers were hesitant about endorsing formal adoptions by single parents, believing that children deserved a two parent family. Changing times have brought increasing numbers of single parents by choice, and society has accepted these families. Now, as agencies search for homes for increasingly difficult children, single parent adoptions are quite common. There is some evidence that single parents may still have difficulty adopting young children, and that there is a tendency to place older and difficult children in these homes.

Though there is little research concerning single parent adoptions, what there is shows successful families. Indeed, single parent homes may have particular strengths for some children who have difficulty dealing with complex relationship patterns. The major concern about single parent adoptions is the economic difficulty of a single wage earner, particularly a woman. The support system available to a single parent in a crisis also needs careful evaluation; the evaluation should probably include not only family and friends, but also organized day care and recreational opportunities available for children.

Books and articles

Bartholet, E. (1993) Family Bonds: Adoption and the Politics of Parenting. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company

Groze, V. and J. A. Rosenthal (1991). "Single Parents and their Adopted Children: A Psychosocial Analysis." Families in Society: The Journal of Contemporary Human Services 9(2): 67-77.

Marindin, H. (1992). Handbook for Single Adoptive Parents. Chevy Chase, MD, Committe for Single Adoptive Parents.

Shireman, J. (1988). Growing up Adopted: An Examination of Major Issues. Portland, OR, Regional Research Institute, Portland State University.

Shireman, J. and P. Johnson (1975). Adoption: Three Alternatives A Comparative Study of Three forms of Adoptive Placement. Chicago, IL, Chicago Child Care Society.

Shireman, J. F. (1995). Adoptions by Single Parents. Single Parent Families: Diversity, Myths and Realities. S. M. H. Hanson, M. L. Heims, D. J. Julian and M. B. Sussman. Binghamton, NY, Haworth Press, Inc