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Dr. Nim Tottenham
Nim Tottenham, Ph.D. is an Assistant
Professor of Psychology at the University of California, Los Angeles. Her
laboratory studies brain development and associated emotional behaviors in
children who have been adopted from orphanages abroad. Visit her
website, which
focuses on use of MRI to understand brain development for children with
developmental challenges.
Dr. Seth Pollak
Dr. Pollak coordinates the
Wisconsin
International Adoption Project and the Child Emotion Lab at the University
of Wisconsin. He is a Distinguished Professor of
Psychology and Professor of Anthropology, Pediatrics, Psychiatry and Public
Affairs at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. He is first author on an
important paper entitled, "Neurodevelopment
Effects of Early Deprivation in Postinstitutionalized Children".
Dr. Femmie Juffer
Dr. Juffer is Professor of
Child and Family Studies at the University of Leiden, Netherlands.She studies behavior problems in internationally adopted children and attachment
interventions.For a bibliography of her work,
follow this link.
A full text article on the
impact of orphanage living on IQ is available here.
Dr. Cheryl Robinson
Dr. Cheryl B. Robinson is Clinical
Assistant Professor at the University of South Alabama College of Nursing,
Mobile, Alabama. Her dissertation explored Competence at Adolescence of a
Group of Internationally Adopted Children from the Former USSR. One
conclusion from the study was that a positive family environment mediated
the risk factors experienced by the internationally adopted children and
positively impacted competence at adolescence for this group of children.
Cohesion in the family (unity, consistency, solidity) was significant with
regards to total competence, social competence, and conduct competence.
Increased levels of conflict in the family were associated with increased
conduct problems. The length of time the child spent in the orphanage and
age at institutionalization was demonstrated to have a statistically
significant impact on competence. The child’s competence -regardless of the
degree of exposure to a positive family, or the length of time since exposed
to risk - was impacted by birth weight.You can contact Dr. Robinson by email
at
crobinson@usouthal.edu
Dr. Catharina Rijk
Dr. Rijk has written
Coping with the Effects of Deprivation, a monograph
describing the social and academic outcomes of internationally adopted children
in the Netherlands.
Dr. Monica Dalen
Dr. Dalen focused her 1992 Ph.D. dissertation on international
adoption in Norway.
Since 1992, she has been Professor of Education at the University of Oslo,
Norway.
Read more about
international adoption research in Scandinavia. Read a
2007 article
on the educational issues of internationally adopted children.
Jesse Snedeker, Ph.D.
Dr. Snedeker is a Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. Dr. Snedeker and her
students conduct research on language development, language comprehension and
language production. She is currently studying early language acquisition in
internationally adopted preschoolers (30m - 6 years)This project has two
goals. First, this research will provide valuable information about the
typical course of development in this population. Second, by examining the
stages of language development in older children, the researchers hope to
learn more about the roles of maturation and experience in language
development. She has co-authored, "Starting
over: international adoption as a natural experiment in language development". For more information about the study, go to:
http://www.wjh.harvard.edu/~lds/adoption/
- Dana Johnson, MD, PhD
Dr. Johnson is director of the International Adoption Clinic at the University of
Minnesota. His research interests are the health status of international
adoptees on arrival and short and long-term effects of institutional care on
physical growth and cognitive development. He is also dad to an
internationally adopted daughter.
International Adoption Clinic - The University of Minnesota
- Hospital and Clinic
- Box 211
- 420 Delaware Street SE
- Minneapolis, MN 55455
- For information call:
- Dana Johnson, MD, PhD
- (612) 626 2928
- To view a document authored by Dr. Johnson entitled "Adopting an
Institutionalized Child: What are the Risks?", please
click here.
- Dr. Jane Aronson
Dr. Aronson
is a researcher and clinician at Winthrop-University Hospital, Mineola, New
York. To read her abstract entitled "Prevalence of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome and
Fetal Alcohol Effect in Pre-adoption Evaluations of Children in Russian
Orphanages", click here.
- Christian Solidarity International
is an organization who investigated the orphanages of the Soviet Union with
regards to their living conditions and allegations of abuse. To read a
synopsis of their report entitled Trajectories of Despair (which
provides some answers to the ubiquitous "oligophrenia" diagnosis seen in
referrals to potential adoptive parents),
click here.
For additional information, please visit Christian Solidarity International
- Elinor Ames, PhD
is a retired developmental psychologist at Simon Fraser University in British
Columbia, Canada. She and her research team studied 115 Canadian families who
had adopted Romanian children. Some were from orphanages; some came directly
from birth families. This study focused on attachment status, behavior,
intelligence and developmental status. Parental stress was also investigated.
They were evaluated at two points in time: at Time 1 they had been in their
homes approximately 11 months; at Time 2, a median of 39 months. To view the
recommendation from her pioneering study, Click here.
To view the results on medical, behavior, and social problems,
Click here
- Laurie Miller, MD
is director of the International Adoption clinic at the Floating Hospital for
Children, New England Medical Center (one of two clinics specializing in the
evaluation of internationally adopted children). She has extensive experience
as a pediatrician in Egypt, China, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bosnia. She has
authored many articles on the topics of international child health and
international adoption. She is also a member of the International Child Health
subcommittee of the American Academy of Pediatrics and is chairperson of its
task force on institutionalized children. To have your child evaluated (either
pre-adoptive records/videos or post-adoption) call (617) 636 8388.
- Dr. Megan Gunnar
at the Child Development Institute at the University of Minnesota is examining
salivary cortisol levels of adoptees from Romania in conjunction with the
study done by Dr. Elinor Ames in British Columbia. Salivary cortisol samples
are being gathered at three points in the day over 3 days to examine the
circadian patterning of cortisol levels in Romanian adoptees. The three time
points are wakeup, noon, and 30 minutes before bedtime. The cortisol data (a
biobehavioral measure of stress) will be examined in relation to the cognitive
and social data that Dr. Ames and her students have collected on these
children. - email Dr. Megan Gunnar .
- Read about Dr. Gunnar's current research project on international adoption.
Read a
2009 paper by Dr. Gunnar and colleagues.
-
- Shron Glennen, Ph.D., CCC-SLP
- is a speech-language pathologist on the faculty of the Communication
Sciences and Disorders Department at Towson University in Baltimore, Maryland.
After adopting two toddler-aged children from Russia, she became interested in
the language acquisition process for post-institutionalized orphans who lose
their native language and have to acquire a new first language. Dr. Glennen is
studying language development patterns of children adopted internationally in
hopes of developing professional guidelines for determining "normal" language
development from patterns that signify language delays or disorders. In
collaboration with her colleague, M. Gay Masters, Ph.D., she is currently
studying the language development of children adopted from eastern Europe who
ages 0 to 36 months of age and plans to follow the children longitudinally
through early school-age. The survey can be located on the web site for the
Eastern European Adoption Coalition at
http://www.eeadopt.org. For more
information, email Dr. Glennen at sglennen@towson.edu
- Dr. Harry Chugani,
Dr. Chugani is a
neuroscientist at Wayne State University, is studying critical periods of
human brain development. His research team uses positron emission tomography
technology in humans complemented by autoradiographic techniques of various
measures (glucose metabolism, protein synthesis, receptors) in various animal
models. They have found that changes in glucose metabolic rates parallel
synaptogenesis and outline a critical period of developmental plasticity. Dr.
Chugani and his team have recently turned their attention to the study of the
effects of an impoverished early environment on brain functional activity as
related to neuropsychological measures. Follow
this link for a full-text paper entitled "Incidence of specific absolute
neurocognitive impairment in globally intact children with histories of
severe deprivation."-
- Dr. Frank Verhulst
is a professor at the Netherlands
Institute for Health Sciences
and Director of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at Erasmus University and
Sophia Children’s Hospital in Rotterdam and former editor-in-chief of the
Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry.
Dr. Verhulst and his team have studied international adoption
for almost 20 years. Here is and example of some of his latest work: - DUTCH
STUDY FINDS MOST INTERNATIONAL ADOPTEES INTERESTED IN SEARCH
A longitudinal study in the Netherlands examined factors related to search
interest and activity among 1,417 international adoptees, ages 24-30, and
classified them into four groups: uninterested non-searchers (36%),
interested non-searchers (32%), searchers (18%), and reunited searchers
(14%). “Young Adult International Adoptees’ Search for Birth Parents,” by
Wendy Tieman, Jan van der Ende and Frank Verhulst, was published in the
October issue of the Journal of Family Psychology (Volume 22, Issue 5)
Overall, those who searched in their 20s had expressed more curiosity about
their origins as adolescents, but researchers also concluded searching was
affected by external factors as well, including a higher divorce rate among
adoptive parents. To access an abstract, go to:
http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/fam/22/5/
- Emory University's Divisions Pediatric Endocrinology and Developmental
Pediatrics
Researchers at Emory University's Divisions Pediatric Endocrinology and
Developmental Pediatrics, are conducting a survey to study the growth and
development of children from orphanages. According to their site: "We know
that maternal deprivation, neglect and severe malnutrition in the early lives
of these children put them at greater risk for growth failure and
developmental delays in the early years. However, little is known about
long-term growth and development of these children. Individual reports suggest
that these children experience long-term growth failure, continued
developmental delays and abnormalities related to the onset of puberty. Visit
their website at
http://www.emory.edu/PEDS/ENDO/orphan/
Professor Sir Michael Rutter- Dr. Rutter has studied child development for 50 years. He was knighted
for his achievements in 1992. Dr. Rutter is coordinator of a longitudinal
study of children from Romanian orphanages who were adopted into the UK.
Read more
about his substantial program of research. An April 2010
monograph by his team will become a classic.
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- Dr. Josephine Ruggiero
is Professor of Sociology at Providence College in Providence, Rhode Island.
Dr. Ruggiero is also a social researcher and, along with her husband, the
adoptive parent of a sibling group of three Russian-born children who joined
their family in September of 1994. Dr. Ruggiero has given presentations on
issues in older-child adoptions and related issues at adoption conferences in
Massachusetts and Rhode Island as well as at the national meeting of the
American Sociological Association. -
- You can contact Dr. Ruggiero by E-mail at
jruggier@ providence.edu.
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