摘要：AbstractObjectivesEmpathy brings people closer and facilitates communication in almost all the fields of daily life. Having been an important dimension of foster care, empathetic skills should be developed in a foster family. In this study, we aimed to determine the empathic level of the foster families.MethodsThis cross-sectional study on foster families was performed in Turkey. Research data were collected from 124 fosters parents. Two instruments were used in the survey: the personal information form and the Basic Empathy Scale. The volunteers were chosen by applyinganon-probability sampling method, i.e. the “snowball” method. The data were analyzed by using SPSS statistical software, Version 18.0.ResultsThe foster parents had a mean age of 48.37±9.36. Most of foster carers (89.5%) were married. 76.6% of foster families had their own biological child, among them, 29.5% had one, 54.7% had two, and 15.8% had three children. The percentage of foster families that preferred female, and male children, were 76.6%, and 23.4%, respectively. Among the children, who had been placed in foster parent households, 42.7% agedless than 3 years, 31.5% between 4-6 years, and 25.8% more than 7 years. The ratio of parents, who defined foster family concept as “social responsibility,” “protection,” “ownage,” and “charity” were 76.6%, 71.1%, 58.1%, and 45.2%, respectively. The ratio of those, who thought that to be a foster carer matureda person, was 62.9%, whereas the ratio of those, who emphasized that they became role model for their environment, was 77.4%. The subjects were asked to empathize with the relevant biological families, and that 59.7% gave first priority to “I want to be sure about my child's safety”, 29.8% to “I want to be sure that my child is in good hands”, 7.3% to “I want to see that my child is valued”. Also 56.5% of foster families pointed out that they were disturbed by the idea that one they the child mightbe sent back to his/her biological family. General Cronbach's alpha co-efficient of the instrument was found to be .76. The cognitive empathy of sub-factors was found to be .78, and the emotional empathy of the sub-factors was .62. Basic Empathy Scale average points were 71.52±9.76 in the parents. The mean cognitive empathy was 34.49±5.79, and the mean emotional empathy was 37.03±6.08.
