Welcome to the website of ‘Your Family, Your Voice’, a groundbreaking new UK wide research study about children and young people being brought up by relatives or friends instead of their parents. Such relatives or friends are often called kinship carers. The research is funded by the Big Lottery Fund and is being carried out by researchers at the University of Bristol in partnership with the Buttle UK children’s charity.
We are currently looking across the UK for people to take part in the project. We want to hear from you if you are:
We would like to speak privately to one carer and one child or young person from each of the families interested in taking part.
Taking part involves a researcher from the University of Bristol visiting families for a couple of hours and asking the carer and young person about their lives. All your replies will be confidential. You will be interviewed separately and will each get a £20 voucher as a thank you for your time.
Our main aim is to make things better for families by giving the government an accurate picture of what the lives of kinship carers and the children they look after are like. We know when children are brought up by relatives or friends this often works very well. Most children benefit and they feel secure and well cared for. But there are additional stresses and difficulties involved in bringing up a relative’s or friend’s child, and the right help might not always be available. We want to know what is working well as it is, what needs changing, and how things can be improved if there are problems.
Only you can tell us this, so if you think you can help us we really want to hear from you. By talking to us you will be helping thousands of families, as we hope this project will contribute to improving services across the UK. You can read more about the aims of the study here .
Please click on ‘The Study’ tab above to find out more about who we are looking for, what’s involved, and how you can take part.
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