The Disappeared Children of El Salvador's Civil War: The Search for Identity and Truth

Abstract

This thesis focuses on the adopted children of El Salvador, who were taken from their parents at a young age and adopted by parents in the United States. This was due to a civil war that happened in El Salvador during the 1970’s. By looking at identity formation, acculturation, attachment theory, and social learning theory, it searches for an understanding of the different psychological effects that these children could have suffered. The book “How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents” is used in this thesis to compare how the Garcia girls and the adopted children from El Salvador both went through similar situations while adapting to their new environments.