Recruiting carers for older children and youth: Messages and methods of media campaigns

In recent decades, foster care systems across western countries have entered a state of crisis with the volume of children entering care outpacing new foster carers. Recruiting carers for older children and youth is particularly challenging, as most new foster carers and adoptive parents prefer younger children. This study reviews out-of-home care recruitment campaigns that target carers for older children and youth, across selected English-speaking countries. A total of 89 campaigns across five countries were analysed to identify common messages and use of persuasive methods (appeal to logic, emotion and character). Three categories of themes underpin the messages used to motivate people to care for an older child: child-focused, carer-focused and community-focused messages. To enhance the recruitment campaigns for carers of older children, the authors draw upon persuasion and social norms theories to recommend a framework integrating message framing, trusted and reliable messengers, collective values of target audience and use of persuasive methods.