Money and Adoptions: Social Representations, Expectations and Opportunities for Italian Families

The aim of the present study was twofold: 1) to explore social attitudes toward children’s world and adoption through the analysis of public communications (Bachrach, London, & Maza 1991; Rompf 1993; Fritz 2005); 2) to find out the differences between families (biological, adoptive and mixed) and professional operators (such as psychologists and social assistants) in the perceived relationship between children, money and family (Bonura 2001; Jervey 2003; Wyatt 2006). The research have considered three phases: a) quail-quantitative research of media communications (newspapers, tv spots and movies through a qualitative ad-hoc grid and T-Lab software for quantitative content analysis); b) intensive-qualitative survey (9 interviews and 2 focus groups), and extensivequantitative survey (600 questionnaires). For these two phases the sample was made up by biological, adoptive and mixed families from Northern Italy and social operators that work both for public service and for private o.n.g. association (Aibi). Between others, evidences from this study underline an important analogy between biological and adoptive families about the moral aspects of the adoption choice and experience. On the other side, this study highlights the difficulties of the socio-psychological aspects of money perception in the adoption experience. In fact, money are considered as «a psychological alibi, a formal excuse», or «something not more important in a adoptive family than in a biological one» and, overall, something that concern the relationship between bank and organisations, and not families and children at all.