Human network formation of who left child foster care institution : From follow‐up survey

本稿は，児童養護施設退所者がどのような困難に遭遇し，どのようなリソースを使ってその困難を軽減，克服した，またはしようとしたかを明らかにし，その対応策を提言することを目的とする．児童養護施設を在所期限で退所した児童が家庭復帰するケースは少ない．18歳で自立を強いられ，進学するにしても学費や生活費は自分で賄わなければならない．児童養護施設出身者の大学進学率は低く，経済的理由から中途退学するケースも多い．したがって，専門学校や大学で新規の友人関係を構築する機会が得られない．また，就職しても虐待などの経験が新規の人的ネットワーク形成を躊躇させてしまう．実親を頼れず，施設職員の忙しさや入れ替わりの激しさを知っていることが職員を頼ることを躊躇させる．退所者は，施設入所時に形成された友人関係や限られた人的ネットワークを利用して，様々な困難を克服しようとする．当事者が設立した支援団体もでき始めているが，まだ規模が小さく，利用者は限られてしまう．生活における情報はネットなどで容易に手に入るが，何でも気軽に聞ける相手がいるかが重要となる．このように，退所者が困難に遭遇した時に気軽に相談できる人がいないことが，最大の問題である．The aims of this paper are to reveal how children who left child foster care institution deal with difficulties and to propose countermeasures for those circumstances. Children who left child foster care institution by the limit age of eighteen rarely go back to their own home. They are expected to be independent at the age of eighteen, and if they want to go on to a higher school they have to earn living expenses and pay for tuitions by themselves. The percentage of those who advance to higher education is quite low and many of them leave schools for financial reasons before graduation. Therefore they don’t have opportunities to make new friends at advanced schools. In addition, experiences of child abuse make them hesitate to construct new human networks. They can’t rely on their parents and they hesitate to rely on care workers knowing they are extremely busy. They attempt to overcome various difficulties by utilizing the friends which were made while they were in the institutions and the limited human networks. Some support organizations which are established by whom left the institutions have begun to grow, but scale is still small, therefore, user is limited. They can easily obtain information of life from such as the Internet; however, it is significant that whether they have someone they can ask anything without hesitation. Thus the main issue is that they have no one to talk to when they encounter with difficulties