The effect of paternal incarceration on children's risk of foster care placement

Research on the relationship between parental incarceration and foster care placement is limited in three ways: (1) it focuses solely on maternal imprisonment and provides neither (2) strong causal tests nor (3) tests of mediation. In this article, we address these gaps by providing a rationale for how paternal imprisonment may increase children's risk of foster care placement and by using Danish registry data to conduct a strong causal test of this relationship (using a recent policy change) and to test relevant mechanisms. The results provide compelling evidence of a causal effect of paternal imprisonment on children's risk of foster care placement in Denmark and imply that changes in family finances and family structure do little to explain these effects.

Duke Scholars

Author Christopher Wildeman Sociology