Advocating for youth in the child welfare system: a person-centered approach

Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) volunteers play a critical role for youth in the child welfare system; however, little is known about the retention of these volunteers. Drawing from the volunteer literature, we examine agency factors that include training and support and individual characteristics (empathy, generativity, perceived costs and benefits of advocating, and commitment). The present study used a person-centered approach with Latent Profile Analysis to investigate whether CASA volunteers have distinct profiles based on individual characteristics that vary across agency training and supervision and predict retention. At T1, 245 advocates provided information on agency training and support, intended retention, and individual characteristics through an online survey; one year later (T2), retention information was collected on 225 of these advocates. We identified three profiles of advocates based on their commonality across individual characteristics (affective and cognitive empathy, generativity, perceived costs and benefits of advocating, commitment). Agency training and support differed across these profiles. Differences across profiles emerged in relation to retention but were not significant at the omnibus level. By identifying different profiles of CASAs, these findings may help agencies identify advocates at risk of leaving or disengaging, allowing more targeted and timely support.