Family relationships matter throughout life. They can be a ressource or a burden, for many individuals they are ressource and burden at the same time. In the life of those who grew up in foster care, the relationships with their biological family members are of particular significance and often they are particular complicated.

How young adults from foster care deal with family relationships and how their relationships with their families changes over time is analyzed in a qualitative longitudinal study at the University of Siegen, Germany. The first interview wave took place between 2007 – 2010. We conducted 100 biographical interviews with young adults from foster care. Most of them aged 18-25. The second interview wave takes place from 2014 – 2016. Up to now we were able to re-interview 14 interviewees. The interview partners were between 24 and 35 years old.

We conducted semi-biographical interviews with them about what happened inbetween interview 1 and 2.

All interviews have in common that the biological family matters and the relationship changes over time. Family relationships are lived in different ways, they differ in their importance and in their meaning for transitions in young adult life (romantic relationships, parenthood, school-to-job-transition). Different patterns of relationships with the biological family and their meaning over time will be presented and discussed.

In all our European societies there are children who cannot grow up in their biological family. For these children, contacts with their biological are considered as particular important. This study is part of an ongoing extensive research that investigates the association between outcomes of foster care, according to the perspectives of foster carers, and the existence, or not, of contact between looked after children and their family. It assesses the perception that foster carers have about looked after children’s reactions during and after the contact visit, as well as the difficulties identified in carrying out the contact visits and the placement outcomes. The questionnaires were completed by foster carers between October 2013 and March 2014 and included 217 looked after children integrated in foster care in the Oporto District, which belonged to 159 biological families and were integrated in 140 different foster care families.

The main results show that contact between looked after children and their biological family does not influence significantly the outcomes of foster care; foster care outcomes were in the majority of the cases classified as successful; the long term placement and almost quasi-adoption is the most common type of foster care in Portugal; logistical difficulties, such as travel costs or the distance between the residences of biological families and foster carers; information and communication technologies can have a significant role in this context, such as social networks, since it may contribute to the maintenance of contact and closeness with the biological family.