In this article, Mark Freado and Howard Bath present the case of an 11 year boy who had been arrested and charged with the murder of his two-year-old cousin. Because of the severity of the criminal charge against this boy, and despite his age, a transfer hearing was set to determine whether he would be tried as a juvenile or an adult. Such…

This paper discusses the Boxall Profile as an assessment and intervention framework designed to support disadvantaged children in mainstream schools. The Boxall Profile was developed in the 1970s in the United Kingdom by Marjorie Boxall to identify children who had come into school unprepared to meet the demands of classroom life and needed…

The family-centered medical home describes an approach to providing comprehensive primary care. Research advances in developmental neuroscience, genetics, and epigenetics offer a framework for understanding the dynamic process of brain development. It is this process that sets the life-course trajectory for an individual; in turn, a child's…

Living in poverty and living in areas of concentrated poverty pose multiple risks for child development and for overall health and wellbeing. Poverty is a major risk factor for several mental, emotional, and behavioral disorders, as well as for other developmental challenges and physical health problems. In this paper, the Promise Neighborhoods…

Food-allergy awareness and management have only lately come to the forefront in early childhood settings, although advocacy organizations have been working on the issue for more than a decade. A national poll (C.S. Mott Children's Hospital 2009) asked parents with children in early education settings if they were aware of what their program does…

Despite significant advances in the field of social neuroscience, much remains to be understood regarding the development and maintenance of social skills across the life span. Few comprehensive models exist that integrate multidisciplinary perspectives and explain the multitude of factors that influence the emergence and expression of social…

There is a very substantial literature over the past 50 years on the advantages of early detection and intervention on the cognitive, communicative, and social-emotional development of infants and toddlers at risk for developmental delay due to premature birth or social disadvantage. Most of these studies excluded children with severe delays or…

Co-existence of disorders--including attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, oppositional defiant disorder, tic disorder, developmental coordination disorder, and autism spectrum disorder--and sharing of symptoms across disorders (sometimes referred to as comorbidity) is the rule rather than the exception in child psychiatry and developmental…

Freud's psychodynamic theory is predominantly based on case histories of patients who displayed abnormal behavior. From a scientific point of view, Freud's analyses of these cases are unacceptable because the key concepts of his theory cannot be tested empirically. However, in one respect, Freud was totally right: most forms of abnormal behavior…

Twelve percent of all children enrolled in commercial plans have special health care needs. Almost 40 percent of them have an emotional or behavioral disorder. These conditions are in many ways more limiting than chronic physical conditions, more difficult to diagnose and treat, and can more severely compromise a child's quality of life. For many…

A conceptual model describing the environmental factors and parent and child characteristics that contribute to the development of conduct disorder in early childhood is proposed. Environmental stressors associated with poverty, poor parenting strategies, and child deficits in communication skills are posited to be negative factors that affect…

This paper introduces a framework for conceptualizing a system of care for children and youth with severe emotional or behavioral disorders built on a child development perspective. The approach focuses on developmental transitions which all children and youth experience. Such transitions include entry into school, negotiating the challenges…

In this discussion of Fritz Redl's model of ego dysfunction in disturbed children, tasks the mature ego must accomplish are described, such as frustration tolerance, temptation resistance, realism about rules and routines, and exposure to competitive challenges. The model's educational applications involve assessment of discipline problems,…

Analyzes a broad range of data examining the relationship among basic skill development, behavior problems, and later negative social development. Results strongly corroborate assumptions that low levels of basic skills at an early age are not per se a precursor of later maladjustment. Includes statistical data and tables. (MJP)

Despite years of concern about the toxic effects of high lead exposure and recent knowledge about the less apparent effects of exposure to low doses of lead, a total of 3 to 4 million children in the United States are still being exposed to concentrations of lead that could compromise their cognitive and social development. This paper discusses:…