The current and intergenerational impact of child fostering on children's nutritional status in rural Mali

This article assesses the determinants of child fostering and its effect on children's nutritional status among the Malian Fulani. Anthropometric evidence indicates that nutritional outcomes are more strongly associated with the reasons for the child's transfer rather than with the fostering per se. These effects persist intergenerationally with the biological children of mothers who were themselves fostered under forced circumstances exhibiting poorer nutritional outcomes than children of mothers who were actively requested by their foster parents during childhood. A bio-social model is presented to understand the intergenerational determinants of these effects and their pathways of influence.