Whats the difference between open and closed adoption?

Question

help!!!! school project

Answer 1

I believe that 'open adoption' is when the records are left open so that the child may look up his/her natural parents once they're older. It would also allow for the maternal parents to find out or to know who adopted their child. A 'closed adoption' would not have any available records.

Answer 2

Try this website:  http://www.adoptionservices.org/adoption...

Hope it helps!

Answer 3

Open adoption is when all identifying information has been exchanged and the birth parents have met the adoptive parents and they have all agreed to some form of on going contact.  How often are pictures sent, minimum number of visits a year, etc.

Closed adoptions is when no identifying information has been exchanged between the birth parents and adoptive parents.  Sometimes there is a third party involved where pictures and letters can be sent by the adoptive parents and the birth parents can then go and pick them up.  There are no phone calls or visits.

Answer 4

the answer to all your questions is in Complete Idiots Guide to Adoption- We found the book very helpfull!!!!

Answer 5

Closed adoption means that the court records are sealed, that there has been an agreement between the birth parents and the adoptive parents for "no contact". Sometimes this is the choice of only one of the parents, and in most cases, very hard to obtain information prior to the child turning 18, and sometimes even after.

Open Adoption means many things. It can be as simple as a letter and pictures to the birth mother once a year, to emails whenever, to actual visitation, where the adoptive parents, birth parents, and the child meet somewhere together to spend time.  In any case, these days, Agencies are stressing more "openess", this is for the child's benefit.  At some point, an adoptive child will begin to ask questions.  When that happens to me with my daughter, I want to be able to give her as many answers as I can to help her feel more comfortable.

Answer 6

A closed adoption is where no identifying information is exchanged between the adoptive family and the biological family.

An open adoption is where varying degrees of identifying information is exchanged between the adoptive and biological family.  This could be as little as a picture to as open as regular visits, knowing where each other live and what each other's names are.  Many people distinguish the various degrees of openess by the following levels, closed, semi-closed, semi-open, and open.

Answer 7

You should be able to find out lots more about this topic on the internet ... but this is what I know for sure.  In an open adoption the mother agrees with the adopted parents that she is still able to have contact with the child that she gives up for adoption for them.  The contact amount and ways of contact will vary depending on what the parties involve agree on.  Usually I think it's more like phone calls and letters versus in person meetings.  Closed adoptions mean no contact, and sometimes depending on what the mother wants, her name and the father's name can be accessed by the adoptee.  This would be if say when the adopted child wants to find her real parents one day...other times the biological mother and father don't want to be contacted at all, and they have the right to that.

Answer 8

Open adoption is where the bio parents (one or both) still have some form of communication or contact with the adoptive family.  It does not mean that the communication must be directly between the adoptive and bio families.  The agency can be the mediator - meaning that an adoptive parent sends a picture or letter every year to the agency who forwards it to the bio family.  It is all dependent on the agreement the families make.  With our "open" adoption, we communicate and visit with the bio-grandparents almost weekly - but that is because we chose to keep them in our son's life as they are who we adopted him from and they are wonderful.

A closed adoption does not necessarily mean the records are sealed, although it could.  A closed adoption simply means that there is no contact between the bio family and the adoptive family after the adoption.  In some cases, you may not even meet the bio family.  States are getting better though at requiring (or at least highly recommending) that bio-parents at least give medical history even in a closed adoption.  

Hope that helps!  Good luck on your school project.

Answer 9

Closed adoption sucks.  I struggled much of my teens years with this.  I was adopted through a closed adoption, and I am not allowed any information on my biological family that will tell me who they are.  I am not even allowed medical information on myself as a newborn or any on my biological relatives.   I wish I was allowed at least medical records.

Open adoptions allow the children to know who their biological families are.  They may even get time to see their birthparents as they grow every so often.  They don't have any secrets in this kind of adoption.  It's open.

Answer 10

*1.  In a confidential (closed) adoption, neither the adopter nor the birthparents know each other, nor do they ever meet. Instead, all the arrangements and paperwork occur through a middleman, usually an adoption agency or an attorney. Some people call this a closed adoption, although I prefer the terms confidential and traditional because they sound nonjudgmental. A confidential adoption doesn't mean that the adopters and birthparents know nothing about each other. What it means is they have no identifying information about each other.

  

    *2. Usually, semi-open refers to an adoption in which the adopters and birthparents meet once or twice and on a first-name-only basis. In addition, they may agree to exchange pictures and letters on an annual or fairly infrequent basis through the adoption arranger. (If your adoption arranger advocates a semi-open adoption, be sure to ask for an exact definition of her terms.)

    *3. In an open adoption, as I define it, the adopters and the birthparents both know each other's full names, both first and last names. (It is not open if only one side has identifying information about the other.) They may agree to exchange photos and letters directly, without using the agency or attorney as a middleman. Sometimes a semi-open adoption later becomes an open adoption, if both parties decide that they want it that way.