Is adoption a successful intervention for the improvement in IQ scores and school achievement? A short review

This paper is a short literature review on the outcomes of adoption on children lived in institutional settings. The review is divided in six sections. The first section refers to the opportunities offered by adoption to study the effects of early experiences on children’s later development. The second section presents the risk and protective factors associated with adoption. The third section refers to the effects of early experiences, prior to adoption, on children’s cognitive development. In the fourth section, the effects of adoption on the children’s cognitive development and school achievement are presented and discussed and the fifth section deals with the adoption as a positive therapeutic intervention that leads to the improvement in children’s IQ scores. The last section is a summary of the entire paper and comes to conclusions about the study of adoptee’s cognitive development and the practical applications associated with adoption and cognitive development.