There are three general adoption categories.
These are private adoption, public adoption, and international adoption.
What is a public adoption? Public adoption is a type of adoption wherein a natural parent puts up his or her child for adoption through the use of a public agency.
Alternatively, the government may also take away custody of a child for his or her natural parents, especially when the parents are incapacitated physically or mentally.
Because of the circumstances that surround the public adoption process, the children here often have many unresolved emotional and mental problems.
Most children in the public adoption process are also older than those available in the private adoption process; about age five and above.
What is a private adoption? Private adoption is a type of adoption wherein a biological parent decides to put up his or her child for adoption, but wants to retain influence over who the adoptive parents are going to be.
Private adoption is usually carried out through personal advertisements.
Prospective parents place an ad for a child, and the natural parent can respond, making his or her choice based on the characteristics of the potential adoptive parents.
Private adoption is usually resorted to by teenage mothers who do not have the capacity to support their own child.
If this is the case, the adoptive parents usually will take care of all the costs connected to the birth and legal transfer of the child.
What is international adoption? As the name implies, international adoption is a type of adoption wherein adoptive parents find a child originally from another country.
This type of adoption has a strong humanitarian component, as many children outside the West lack adequate food, clothing and shelter.
While a bit more expensive than the other adoption modes, more people are looking into it as time goes by.