Family Placements for Adults and Children—A Double Comparison

SUMMARY This article compares family placements for adults with those for children with special needs. Findings are presented of a postal survey which was carried out in the UK and closely based on a survey undertaken shortly before in the USA and Canada. There were a number of similarities between the programmes for adults and specialist schemes for children, despite their different purposes, origins and contexts. Although outcomes are often good, both types of project have worrying levels of breakdown, whilst a number of adult schemes are precarious in status and resourcing.