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Journal of Social and Personal Relationships
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Uncertainty management and adoptees’ ambiguous loss of their birth parents

Kimberly A. Powell

Luther College, powellki{at}luther.edu

Tamara D. Afifi

Pennsylvania State University

According to the National Adoption Information Clearing House (2000; http://www.calib.com/naic/statistics.htm) 120,000 children each year are adopted in or into the US. Much has been written about the attachment and adjustment issues adoptees experience, yet there has been no comprehensive study on the loss felt by adoptees as they reach adulthood. This study of 54 adult adoptees extends the literature on uncertainty management and ambiguous loss by examining how these forces inform one another in the context of adoption. More specifically, it builds upon the uncertainty management literature by investigating the multiple ways in which adoptees experience uncertainty and loss and how these experiences, and the management responses that result from them, are shaped by the familial, perceptual, and situational factors that comprise them.

Key Words: adoption • ambiguous loss • information seeking • uncertainty management

Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, Vol. 22, No. 1, 129-151 (2005)
DOI: 10.1177/0265407505049325
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K. R. Steuber and D. Haunani Solomon
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Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, October 1, 2008; 25(5): 831 - 855.
[Abstract] [PDF]