Feelings Toward Adoption and Well-Being Among Adolescent Adoptees

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

This study explores how adolescents internalize their adoptive identity and its impact on well-being. It examines feelings about adoption among 541 adoptees aged 11–18 from the 2018 Health Behavior in School-aged Children (HBSC) Study in Spain. Findings show that younger adolescents (11–12) tend to express positive feelings, while older adolescents (13+) develop more complex, ambivalent perspectives. Three emotional profiles emerged: predominantly positive, predominantly negative, and a third one characterized by the presence of both positive and negative feelings. Finally, positive feelings were linked to higher wel-lbeing, while negative ones were associated with lower well-being.