Intergenerational leisure spaces and social support networks among care leavers

Abstract

Care leavers with fragile or absent social network support transition quickly into adulthood by supporting themselves from a very young age, affecting their psychological and social development. The aim of this research was to identify how intergenerational spaces, meaningful support networks and family relations are constructed by and by this vulnerable youth. To this end, a qualitative study was carried out in which twenty semi-structured interviews were conducted with young people leaving the child protection system and fifteen professionals in socio-educational intervention who work with this group. From the analysis of their discourses, the results point to a marked absence of adult referents outside the institutional fabric, especially at the beginning of the transition to independent life. Likewise, the existence of a social support network is evidenced, mainly constituted by other young people known throughout their trajectory in the protection system. The testimonies gather the experiences, lived throughout their transit through the protection system, which encourage the interaction of these young people with people of other ages, especially in intergenerational spaces of leisure and community services, which emerge as an alternative and opportunity to weave a more solid and heterogeneous social network that facilitates the transition to adult life of these young people. This open up a line of future research to optimise psychoeducational intervention with this group.