Everyone is pretty familiar with the term adoption. But what other terms related to the topic do you know? What terms should everyone know in terms of adoption? Here, we will go over a list of adoption terms everyone should know.

What Adoption Means 

You probably have a good understanding of what adoption means, but we’ll go over it anyways to make sure everyone reading this has the same references. An adoption is a legal and social process. During this process, parental rights are transferred. Usually, the parental rights of biological parents is transferred to adoptive parents. Two sets of parents and a child or children are directly involved during this process, but there’s a number of others involved too. We’ll go over titles of people involved and what the titles mean below.

Who’s Involved during an Adoption? 

During the adoption process, the person being adopted is known as the adoptee. The two sets of parents are categorized as biological and adoptive. The biological parents are the man and woman responsible for creating the child. The adoptive parents are the couple who will assume legal responsibility of the child.

In most situations, there is an adoption facilitator involved in this process. A facilitator is the person who helps match prospective parents with children who need adopted. Some adoptions will also include the services of an adoption professional who is a person that specializes in adoptive services. The facilitator and adoption professional tasks may be handled by one person or two people who work side-by-side.

Types of Adoption 

Just like no two children are alike, neither are adoptions. In the United States, there are primarily five types of adoption including independent, public, closed, private, and open. It’s important to understand the differences between these processes to understand the role of the biological parents and kin in the adoptee’s life.

An independent adoption is a process that is carried out without agency oversight. Often an independent adoption occurs when the prospective and biological parents have a previous relationship and have legally agreed upon the terms of the adoption.

A private adoption is a process that is carried out by a private, non-government institution or agency. A public adoption is a process carried out by a public, government-funded agency. The last two types of adoption are different because it involves personal and identifying factors about each set of parents.

During an open adoption process, both sets of parents will exchange personal information. Usually, in these scenarios, there is an ongoing relationship or contact between biological parents, adoptive parents, and the adoptee.

A closed adoption is different than an open adoption because there is no identifying or personal information traded.

It’s our hopes that you have a better understanding of some of the most common terms related to adoption after reading this article.