The Minnesota Transracial Adoption Study

ABSTRACT There is a body of emerging research that investigates whether adopted adolescents are more likely to develop behavior problems than their biological counterparts. However, few investigations have considered whether there are differences among adoption groups as to the development of behavior problems. The purpose of this study was to explore differences in psychosocial adjustment among transracia adoptees, Caucasian adoptees, and their non-adopted siblings during late adolescence/early adulthood, a potentially vulnerable point in their development. Analyses in this paper are based on parental interview data of 240 children in 91 adoptive families. Participants were on average nineteen years of age. Based on the interview data, four composite scales were created to assess school problems, behavior problems, general health, and delinquency. It was found that the majority of children in the transracial adoptive families did not show evidence of poor psychosocial adjustment as portrayed by the perce...