My publications
foster mother and child; selenite sculpture by Gera ter Meulen

KnowledgeBureau ter Meulen

When organizations make decisions on important items as the lifelong development of adopted and foster children, it is of paramount importance to be optimally informed. Decisions should be supported by state-of-the-art concepts and scientific knowledge. To help to get access to this KnowledgeBureau ter Meulen provides “Knowledge as a service”. This service includes a website with information on scientific articles on adoption and foster care. You can find  articles by clicking 'interesting research' or by translating the Dutch information- which is fortunately easily done by using translation websites. Are you interested in my (Dutch) popularized summaries of recently published research? You can enscribe in the 'Inschrijven Voor de Kennisflits' at the bottom of this page. 

Press Release of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW), October 19th 2022:


De la Court Prize 2022 for Gera ter Meulen. A crowning achievement for unique research on adoption and foster care


De la Court Prize

The De la Court Prize recognises individuals who have carried out exceptional scientific work in the field of social sciences or humanities unpaid and independently, outside the appropriate academic bodies. Gera ter Meulen receives the De la Court Prize 2022 for her research on adoption and foster care. She set up her own scientific knowledge bureau, providing a clever example of how an independent researcher can operate, according to the jury. The award rewards unpaid and independent research outside established academic institutions.  

Scientifically sound and accessible information on adoption and foster care. That is the common thread running through Gera ter Meulen's research. Thanks to her research, this information is available for politics, policy and practice.

 

About Gera ter Meulen

Gera ter Meulen founded KennisBureau ter Meulen in 2017. Before that, Ter Meulen was a researcher and coordinator of the ADOC (Adoption Triangle Research Centre) for many years and also worked in practice as a policymaker. Her bureau makes scientific knowledge on foster care, adoption and residential care accessible. With her Knowledge Bureau, Gera ter Meulen took over the valorisation of knowledge and doing research from the ADOC and still continues this. 

Ter Meulen is a social entrepreneur and does much of her work unpaid. She maintains a database of scientific articles and a website on residential care, foster care and adoption, as well as writing knowledge flashes, blogs, scientific articles and policy responses.

 

Partly because of her connection between science and practice, Ter Meulen's contributions are taken seriously. For instance, she informed MPs and ministers about gaps in the Joustra Committee report on inter-country adoption. Ter Meulen provided insight into what science knows about inter-country adoption. She advocated for a scientific section within the Expertise Centre for Adoption and the establishment of a chair on adoption at a University.

 

De la Court Award ceremony

The De la Court Award was presented on 21 November 2022.

About the work of Gera ter Meulen

I focus on scientific research on effects of adoption and foster care. Therefore I make inventories of the international scientific literature and translate the most important research into accessible news items. I use scientific information to answer questions from the field and policy through literature research and from my own research in cooperation with Leiden University. Other activities are presentations and courses.
Formerly I was the coordinator of ADOC, Knowledge Centre for adoption and foster care, at Leiden University under supervision of prof.dr. Femmie Juffer. When ADOC stopped in 2017, I continued most of the work as KnowledgeBureau terMeulen.
Examples of my research projects are the studies on the wellbeing and needs of adoptees with special needs, the scientific underpinning of a new method on matching of foster children and implementation study, and the survey on satisfaction with adoption. The research on satisfaction of adult adoptees was commissioned for the EurAdopt Conference on the Relevance of Adoption in 2016  and has been published free access in the journal 'Adoption and Fostering'. 

Some publications in English

Overview of scientific publications on relinquishment and adoption

In response to the Dutch investigation on abuses in intercountry adoption in the past, the Minister promised to establish an Adoption Expertise Center (INEA). One of the objectives was that INEA would combine, develop and open up knowledge about intercountry adoption and develop knowledge about issues not widely researched but important for adoptees. Therefore I made an inventory of peer-reviewed scientific publications (2009 - July 2022) on relinquishment and adoption from the ADOC/Kbtermeulen database, determining the main themes researched and themes hardly researched, and changes in topics in time. Access to the publication

Adoptees feelings about relinquishment, adoption and satisfaction with life

Ter Meulen, G., Smeets, D., & Juffer, F. (2019). The relation between adult adoptees’ feelings about relinquishment, adoption and satisfaction with life. Adoption and Fostering 43(2), 192-209


Intercountry adoption evokes both positive and negative reactions, and the debate extends deep into policy-making. Relinquishment and adoption are profound interventions in people’s lives. Media coverage often predominantly highlights negative stories about adoption. But does this image reflect how most of the 40,000 intercountry adoptees in the Netherlands actually feel about their adoption? To gain more clarity on this question, a survey study was conducted in 2016, exploring the satisfaction of a large and diverse group of intercountry adoptees in the Netherlands.


Thanks to the collaboration of adoption agencies, adoptive parents, and adoptee organizations, a varied group of adoptees was able to have their voices heard: adoptees critical of adoption, those who view it positively, and many who are usually absent from media discussions. The findings of this study have now been published in a scientific article in the journal Adoption and Fostering.


Satisfied with their lives
 A large group of 1,155 intercountry adoptees — adopted between 1961 and 1998 from 32 different countries — responded to the survey. And what did it show? Despite often difficult beginnings, the vast majority of adult adoptees were able to build lives they were satisfied with. In fact, they reported being slightly more satisfied with their lives than the average Dutch population.


Adoption and relinquishment
The majority of adoptees also expressed positive feelings about their adoption and being relinquished. Over 90 percent stated that they rarely or never experienced negative emotions about having been adopted or given up for adoption. Eighty percent reported often to always feeling positive about their adoption. Their feelings about being relinquished were more ambivalent. One adoptee wrote:

"I believe that being adopted is the best bandage for the life-sized wound that being relinquished has left in my life."

Adoptees' feelings about their adoption were closely linked to their overall life satisfaction: on average, adoptees satisfied with their adoption were also satisfied with their lives.


The effect of time
When preparing the questionnaires, adoptee organizations emphasized that their members often changed their views on adoption as they moved through different life stages. The study confirmed this: half of the adult adoptees indicated that their perception of their adoption had changed over time. For the vast majority, positive emotions became stronger, while negative feelings diminished.


Proper care
 In contrast, it turned out that the oldest adoptees were the least satisfied with their adoption and relinquishment experiences. This discrepancy is likely due to the circumstances surrounding adoptions in an era when little was known about adoption’s psychological and social impact. At the time, there was no proper regulation for intercountry adoptions, limited guidance for adoptive parents, and hardly any specialized aftercare services. Based on the results of this study, the authors therefore emphasize the importance of good regulation, thorough preparation for adoptive families, and specialized Post Adoption Services.

For China: development of children in institutional care compared to development of children in family care
For China I made an overview of scientific literature why especially for younger children foster care is much more preferable than institutional care. This article gives an overview on developmental processes in children, their brain development, missed development in orphanage care and recovery in family care. It includes some items on the UN Guide for Alternative Care.
Satisfaction of foster carers
For a fostering organization I longitudinally monitored the satisfaction of their foster parents in 2019 and 2021.
In 2019 I organized a study trip for professionals, foster parents and foster alumni to the UK to learn about enhancing stability in foster care.
This resulted in the project Mockingbird NL, in which we explored whether the Mockingbird Family Model, a model in which foster parents support each other in a constellation with an always available experienced foster parent as central hubhome parent, would be an asset to the Dutch fostering situation. In the near future, with subsidies of welfare organizations, the model will be implemented in the Netherlands. I am responsible for developing monitoring and independent research on the implementation.

Most relevant publications


Here is an overview of the most relevant publications I have written. When the publications are freely available, you can open them via the publication link. Some of the publications in English, when they are in Dutch, this is indicated, but can be translated with currently available translation programmes.


My publications