Figure A: In this process, fAIce uses advanced facial recognition to identify individuals by scanning their faces and checking their identity in the Major Database. It does this by referencing the genetic data stored in the XX (maternal) and XY (paternal) contributors.

Figure B: If a person does not have their XX and XY contributor’s in the system, fAIce cannot verify the individual’s identity because it cannot match the individual’s facial features with any datasets.

In the future, a cutting-edge identification security system known as fAIce has supplanted conventional methods of identification. Avon, who was adopted as an infant from China, enjoys a nurturing home with her beloved Hosts, whom she fondly refers to as her Mom and Dad. Without XX and XY contributors, the individual is labeled an Entity and has to gain five endorsements of identity confirmation every time an identity verification is needed (transit, transactions, ATMs, etc.)

Since Avon doesn't have XX and XY contributors registered in fAIce, she is considered an Entity. Instead, her data is stored under her Hosts' (her adoptive parents') datasets. This temporary registration allows her to have a form of identification, however, it also means their status cannot be a Family.When Avon turns 12, her data will be removed from her hosts' registry unless she participates in the New fAIce Program.

The New fAIce Program offers a solution for Avon to be officially recognized by fAIce. Top surgeons collaborate to create a facial structure that combines features from both of Avon's Hosts. This specially designed face would allow fAIce to identify Avon's Hosts as the XX and XY contributors, establishing a faux genetic connection. Being recognized by fAIce would give Avon a sense of belonging and also change her and her Hosts' statuses to officially be a Family. Avon would be officially recognized as a Child, and her Hosts as parents.

Through The New fAIce program, Avon and her Hosts can finally be recognized as a Family.

What if we make physical appearance a basis for legitimizing ourselves as a family member?

The design emphasizes physical appearance and familial relationships, highlighting how we tie part of our identity to looks. Much like the topic of Asian American transracial adoption itself, this design opens up broader conversations that surround complex and sensitive topics surrounding cultural identity, ethnic identity, race, and family. Asian American transracial adoptees face experiences that resonate with other people who have faced challenges being in a community they do not match such as, but not limited to, first-generation immigrants and biracial families.

The design’s limited focus on non-biologically related families (Hosts and Entities) provides a space to ask questions about the implications of this design for other forms of a family who may not look alike including foster families, same-sex families, and step-families.

Sensitive topics like race are hard to approach in day-to-day interactions, yet are necessary to understand the lasting impacts current mental models and assumptions have. This design provides a space to spark not only conversations about the Asian American transracial adoptee experience, but also broader conversations that touch on such sensitive topics that can provide a deeper understanding of the complexities of race, culture, identity, and family.

This speculative future was informed by a literature analysis, interviews with five Asian American transracial adoptees, an annotated portfolio, and a cultural probe. Read the full research here.

literature analysis

What is an adoptive identity?

Racial, ethnic, and adoptive identities are crucial to one's sense of self. While everyone has racial and ethnic identities, adoptive identity is unique to adoptees. Transracial adoption involves psychology, sociology, and race. Six aspects helped me understand adoptive identity and its development in transracial adoptions.

1 | The Transrational Adoptee Paradox

The Transracial Adoptee Paradox, as defined by Lee (2003), is when adoptees are racial/ethnic minorities but are perceived and treated as members of the majority culture (i.e., White and European) due to being adopted into a White family. This paradox highlights the unique challenges faced by transracial adoptees and their families due to the mismatch in racial appearance.

2 | Ethnic socialization

Ethnic socialization in an Asian American adoptee’s context refers to the exposure of Asianic culturally-relevant practices in the child’s life; these can often take the form of language classes, celebration of holidays, etc. Hu, Zhou, and Lee (2017) point out that involving these practices can help the child find comfort with their ethnic identity growing up. Ethnic socialization often is the self-given responsibility of the parent who intentionally finds opportunities to provide their children with practices related to their child’s heritage.

3 | Racial socialization

Ethnic socialization for Asian American adoptees involves exposing them to culturally relevant practices like language classes and holiday celebrations. Hu, Zhou, and Lee (2017) note that these practices help the child feel comfortable with their ethnic identity. Parents often take it upon themselves to provide these cultural experiences.

4 | The "Colorblind approach"

A "colorblind approach" to raising a transracial child treats them as if they have no race or nationality. Laybourn (2017) points out that this can make the child feel 'foreign' due to differing physical appearances. Interviews with Korean-American adoptees revealed instances of children wanting to change their race or feeling ashamed of it. Docan-Morgan (2010) notes that children may hide racial aggressions to protect their parents, ignoring the reality that they are perceived as different (i.e., not White).

5 | Dissonance

“The dissonance that TRIAs (transracial and international adoptees) feel due to differences in their physical appearances and cultural affiliations builds over time, and they ultimately may seek to resolve it” (Baden, Treweeke, and Ahluwalia, 2012). Asian American adoptees often feel different from the culture they live in because of their physical features (Laybourn, 2017). They do not fully belong to either their birth or adopted cultures. As this dissonance grows, they seek to reclaim their racial culture, a process Baden, Treweeke, and Ahluwalia (2012) call “culture reculturation,” which aligns their visible appearance with their internal experiences. Ethnic identity can further develop through cultural ties like homeland tours or birth country visits (Napier, 2010).

6 | Discourse amongst family is essential

Discourse about the adoptee within the family is crucial for developing a strong, comfortable identity (Tan and Liu, 2018). This can include direct conversations, actions, and discussions around the child. Laybourn (2017) found that adoptees whose parents emphasized their shared fate were more likely to identify with their ethnic background (e.g., Korean–American). Transparency about the child's racial difference fosters understanding of their racial and ethnic identity and prepares them for future uncertainties and situations (Laybourn, 2017).

research synthesis

A key site from which all of the experiences stem is the difference in how adoptees look from the rest of the community they are adopted into (geographic and familial).

If adoptees didn’t look racially Asian, the experiences they face would not incur dissonance and they would not encounter the Transracial Adoptee Paradox. Adoptees have an innate connection to their cultural heritage whether or not they acknowledge it growing up. This can be seen especially with the research about “colorblind parenting.” Although it may seem that raising a child to be the same as a racially different family would not matter; however, it can create negative and confusing emotions surrounding the child’s cultural identity growing up.

What is the adoptee experience?

The literature consulted gave insight into adoptive identity development primarily through psychological and sociological lenses. I spoke to five Asian American transracial adoptees to gain firsthand experiences on what it was like growing up, as well as how they came to develop their adoptive identity.

abandonment

“... as a kid, you know, I kind of was like, Oh, this is all my fault. You know, I must have been a terrible person... So they got rid of me and all that kind of stuff.” - Interview C

“...I'm sure if I saw an actual psychologist, they would be like, Oh, do you think this is because you were abandoned as a child?...which is one of the reasons I don't want to see a psychologist just in general is because I don't want someone to say that because I don't feel like it comes from that. I feel like it comes more from just being an only child and being alone, you know?” - Interview A

Guilt

“And I kind of felt bad for some of the girls that I went on the tour with because some of them had an internal struggle, if you will, of like, like, this is my heritage, but I grew up in America and like, which, where do I belong? And who am I? And I feel like I've never really had that issue.” - Interview D

“... [another adopted friend] kind of struggled with, like being adopted and feelings of unwantedness or like, it's kind of like that kind of thing. I don't think I ever really felt that. And I kind of felt guilty for not feeling that…” - Interview B

Gratitude

"Oh, just like, just like grateful for like the family that I have now. And, um, just like all of the things I've been blessed with with this life." - Interview D

“But I think some people really get like, bogged down by the feeling like the feeling that they were given up or like not wanted, but I view it more as given opportunity for a better life…” - Interview B

lost history

“We also lost their birth family and our birth mother, our whole family tree, a whole history. It's like It's like we're a book with the with the prologue ripped out…” - Interview E

“It's just like, minor inconveniences. It's not like a huge looming thing on my life. But I'm like, I wonder my medical history. I want to know what time I was born. But I don't know them. But yeah, it just be like, especially like breast cancer. I want to know if I need to worry about that.” - Interview B

looking Chinese

“They're going to obviously group me in these kind of stereotypes. Like, Oh look, it's a smart Asian table over there. So I'm like, yeah, I don't want to do that. I'll go over here. Okay.” - Interview A

"Also, I would also, I may not adopt from China. But I tell people that if I adopt, I want to have Asian children for like, just so that they have someone who looks like growing up." - Interview C

feeling Chinese

“I think because it's kind of like I guess I don't feel that about Asian America. I feel like a bad Chinese American.” - Interview C

“Okay, well, even if I speak English, don't speak Chinese, you know, live with my white parents, etc, etc. I have that legacy. And to me, it was just the difference of now seeing what Chinese American means to different people.” - Interview C

coping with the adoption mystery

“There are a lot of complications, and we'll just never know.” - Interview C

“It can give you a new perspective. Like, wow, it was probably a really heartbreaking decision.” - Interview B

overall takeaways

Coping with being adopted meant accepting the circumstances around their adoption will remain a mystery.

Guilt, gratitude, curiosity, and abandonment are shared emotions that varied in their origins, whom it was directed to, and the degree of intensity.

Feeling and looking Chinese showed recognition that how they look will affect how they are treated regardless of how they identify (Transracial Adoptee Paradox).

The insights showed how much self-reflection it takes to grow up as an adoptee, as well how their experiences had embedded sites of struggle between how they were identified vs. how they wanted to be identified.

I left the interviews having mixed feelings about what to highlight through the design as every finding felt so diverse from one another. I wanted to identify how these thoughts and experiences connected to one another to help me ideate on what to include in the design.

Juxtaposing the AsAmTA experience to ideate

The interviews provided evidence that being an adoptee comes with a whirlwind of emotions sparked by circumstances and people. In order to create potential spaces for ideation, an annotated portfolio was created to find connections and juxtapositions between various categories. Two main insights were found.

Images and Concepts included

Enculturation activities
Mixed race families
Interview quotes
Emotions
AR/VR filter uses

two main insights emerged

1. Appearances matter to connect insides to outsides

A ‘banana’ is a term used to describe someone who has Asian racial features but have (subjectively) culturally ‘white’ tendencies. Interviewees used this term to self-describe how they felt like a ‘bad Chinese.’ The idea of looking like something that doesn’t fit what people expect can create emotionally charged responses, as was seen with the story of a Chinese livestreamer with a beautiful voice. Her facial filter that made her look younger glitched, causing audiences to be angry for having been duped.

The connection between these two ideas made me ask, “If someone with ‘white’ tendencies yet looked Asian was to have their appearance changed to be Caucasian, would that have caused the anger even though their ‘insides would match their outsides?”

2. Adoptees reflect on alternate realities

The idea of an immersive reality that is constructed around someone using AR/VR is similar to an adoptee being immersed in their heritage world during a heritage trip. However, unlike an AR/VR reality that could never be real, an adoptee’s immersion gives them a sense of what could have been. There is continual speculation and comparison of an adoptee’s current life vs. what could have been (i.e. an alternate reality) as seen in the interviews.

Although the annotated portfolio didn’t drive ideation as much as I originally wanted it to, it did give further questions into the importance of racial appearances, and how much speculating 'what could have been' helps in an adoptee's life.

cultural probe

What is significant during childhood?

Since developing a healthy adoptive identity during childhood can create a foundation for a well-developed sense of identity, I decided to create a cultural probe to help give me inspiration for designs that would fit ubiquitously in childhood.

The probe was delivered to two AsAmTA’s via separately shared Google Slide documents with instructions. The probe consisted of four activities delivered to two transracial adoptees with activities designed to ask:

What are artifacts that leave significant imprints on a child?
What are emotions/memories that develop a relationship between a child and a parent?
What would it feel like to write your own life story?

Activity 1 | What my toys say about me

Goal: Identify what artifacts were significant enough to people during their childhood.

Activity 2 | Childhood story

Goal: See what themes emerge if adoptees could write their own life story.

Activity 3 | Collage of feelings

Goal: See how individuals reflect on the feelings they received from their family.

Activity 4 | Toy designer

Goal: See how they feel a toy would express love to a young child.

Insights

All emotions exhibited had a sense of warmth and positivity. Family love is powerful and positive.

Love can be expressed through words, shapes, hugs, and warmth.

There was a set of parents in each story that they weren’t biologically born to.

Love/care was expressed to them through nurturing and growth. Love/care was shown to others through time/effort.

The time spent with the objects helped create attachments as well as form specific memories with them.

The probe showed that being an adoptee is just a point in life, but it’s not the central one. Instead, the activities showed that love, care, and nurturing take many forms and is what is remembered after growing up.

research synthesis

Overall Insights

The topic of Asian American transracial adoptees spans many complex topics, including race, cultural identity, and ethnic identity. An adoptive identity is an important part for an adoptee to come to terms with to help their overall identity come to fruition; however, it must be remembered that it is only one locus of their identity and lives.

Adoptive identity is a small yet significant part of identity.

A cultural probe delivered to two Asian American transracial adoptees showed how being adopted is part of their identity but is not the defining piece of their life. In Activity 2 of the probe where the participants wrote fictional stories about their lives, they both made the point they were not biologically related to the family they grew up with at the beginning of the story, but it wasn’t the central part of the story. Even in CP-B’s story, where they were born as a water child, they ended up having additional plant powers. Being adopted doesn’t define or confine who they are, yet current mental models surrounding family and adoptees make it hard to develop their adoptive identity.

Why is it hard to cope?

Ill-disposed discourse about being adopted is more probable for transracial adoptees due to obvious physical differences between them and their adopted families. This discourse can lead to adoptees facing questions they are ill-equipped to handle which creates persisting negative emotions surrounding their adoption. Adoptees are put on the spot to answer questions such as, “Is that your parent?” Conversations about being adopted can easily bring up questions surrounding an adoptee’s unknown past such as “Do you know about your real parents?” and others. This also brings up conversations that can spark negativity toward being adopted, such as pointing out the assumption that a child was unwanted.

There is also the assumed cultural tie to another country due to different racial features. Although born and raised in white/western culture, experiences occur that connect the adoptee to Asia or their country of birth such as racial stereotypes or assumptions that they practice a certain culture. This is what aids the creation of dissonance felt by transracial adoptees and the creation of the Transracial Adoptee Paradox. These experiences inherently tell them that they are Asian yet are not ‘Good Asians,’ which makes them consider an alternate reality of what they would be if they were not adopted.

ASSOCIATION BETWEEN ADOPTION AND BEING UNWANTED

Through the interviews and literature analysis, it was shown that the discourse surrounding love and acceptance was what helped create an understanding of the question ‘Why was I adopted’ growing up, but what can be challenging is that creating that acceptance can be overshadowed by the idea that a parent not wanting a child is wrong. There is a mental model around traditional family relationships and values that says giving up a child is not what a parent can do unless the child is unwanted. This mental model makes the adoptee unable to separate their lives from being the result of their biological parents’ abandonment. Interview C spoke of how they struggled to come to terms with their adoptive identity well into middle school because they couldn’t separate the idea of a parent giving them up from being unwanted. They resorted to self-blame as a form of rationalization for being adopted. It wasn’t until they were able to accept the mystery behind their parents’ circumstances that they could finally accept that just because they were adopted didn’t mean they were unwanted.

This reflection to come to terms with being adopted wasn’t limited to Interview C; other interviewees spoke of how they realize their birth parents must have faced certain circumstances to give up a child. Just because they were put up for adoption does not mean they were unwanted. It's not until an adoptee can accept that the circumstances surrounding their birth parents' decision will remain a mystery that they can dissolve negative emotions surrounding their adoption and move forward.

Developing an adoptive identity is necessary

Being able to come to terms with being adopted allows adoptees to feel comfortable with themselves. However, without an adoptive identity, they are unable to fully become comfortable with their cultural and ethnic identity leading them to potentially resort to self-blame for being adopted in the first place and feel like a “forever foreigner” (Tuan & Shiao, 2011). An important piece of coping with being adopted as shown through interviews and cultural probe is that the reason for being given up for adoption doesn’t define who an adoptee is. What matters is that an adoptee is here now.

What adoptees need is to know that it doesn’t matter why they were put up for adoption, but that they are here now.

In order to make this message clear to help adoptees form their own adoptive identity, traditional biological-parent roles and assumptions need to be challenged since love and family shouldn’t be based on biology or the past.

Designing for Asian American Adoptees

Overview

What informed the speculative design

What is an adoptive identity?

What is the adoptee experience?

Juxtaposing the AsAmTA experience to ideate

What is significant during childhood?

Overall Insights

Using speculative design can spark the necessary conversations