With only 559 children placed in foster care across India as of 2025, the foster care system remains nascent yet positioned for rapid expansion as policy priorities shift from institutional to family-based alternative care. This transition presents both opportunity and risk: while policy is advancing, the support infrastructure for foster families has not kept pace.
Using Behavioural Insights (BI) and Human-Centred Design (HCD) approaches, this multi-stakeholder initiative mapped the foster parents' caregiving journey and their needs to inform the design of a responsive parenting package. The resulting five-phase journey map (Awareness, Application, Initial Adjustment Period, Stabilization and Growth, Closure) identified 53 distinct needs across critical touchpoints; with 30 prioritized for the parenting intervention package.
Findings highlight needs that, when addressed, can enhance parenting practices and promote nurturing family environments for children. These needs include increasing public visibility for foster care and clarity on its temporary nature, navigating complex application process while addressing their own readiness and social stigma, establishing stability for the child through routines and extended family's sensitisation during initial adjustment, building nurturing care capabilities across communication, safety, socialization, learning, and health domains. Effective management of foster term closure scenarios, including reunification with biological family, placement disruption, and transition to independent living when a child turns eighteen, is also crucial.
The BI-HCD approach engaged diverse stakeholders in validating lived experiences and co-creating solutions. This participatory initiative strengthens emerging child protection systems and lays an evidence-based foundation for scaling family-based alternative care across India.
With only 559 children placed in foster care across India as of 2025, the foster care system remains nascent yet positioned for rapid expansion as policy priorities shift from institutional to family-based alternative care. This transition presents both opportunity and risk: while policy is advancing, the support infrastructure for foster families has not kept pace.
Using Behavioural Insights (BI) and Human-Centred Design (HCD) approaches, this multi-stakeholder initiative mapped the foster parents' caregiving journey and their needs to inform the design of a responsive parenting package. The resulting five-phase journey map (Awareness, Application, Initial Adjustment Period, Stabilization and Growth, Closure) identified 53 distinct needs across critical touchpoints; with 30 prioritized for the parenting intervention package.
Findings highlight needs that, when addressed, can enhance parenting practices and promote nurturing family environments for children. These needs include increasing public visibility for foster care and clarity on its temporary nature, navigating complex application process while addressing their own readiness and social stigma, establishing stability for the child through routines and extended family's sensitisation during initial adjustment, building nurturing care capabilities across communication, safety, socialization, learning, and health domains. Effective management of foster term closure scenarios, including reunification with biological family, placement disruption, and transition to independent living when a child turns eighteen, is also crucial.
The BI-HCD approach engaged diverse stakeholders in validating lived experiences and co-creating solutions. This participatory ini ...
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