Although social development is a commonly cited educational goal, little systematic programming occurs for the development of social skills among the preschool handicapped, especially for the development of interpersonal skills. Insight into the reasons for this neglect leads to suggestions for correcting it. (Author/CL)

Results of a study of social interactions of 33 developmentally delayed preschoolers suggested the existence of major deficits in peer-related social interactions for delayed children and the absence of specific individual social behaviors highly associated with peer-related social competence. (CL)

Parents of gifted children need to understand the child's special emotional needs and recognize the importance of letting the children have time to be children without unreasonable expectations and demands. (CL)

Conceptual problems relating to the definition of social competency in young children are reviewed. Twenty nine competency statements are given, and implications for measurement, research, and policy relating to young children are also discussed. (CS)

A review of The Psychology of Play (Penquin, 1968) by Susanna Millar. (DS)

Sketches a model which considers society a teacher which instructs like an operant box..." The author contends that the family, the school, the play group, the adolescent gang, the office, the prison, the mental hospital, each reward, instruct and control the individual who learns by operant means what the institution teaches." (Author/AL)

Voluntary service programs in Latin America can serve to complement systematized education, especially for those young people who were forced to leave school at an early age or who never had access to it. (AN)

Sixteen preschoolers from homes with conjugal violence were compared with 16 controls from nonabusive homes. Children of abused mothers performed more poorly than controls on three of four measures of empathy (role enactment, social inference, and role taking). Implications for social development were noted. (CL)

The study attempted to clarify the role of empathy in the development of antisocial and aggressive delinquent behavior in 331 delinquents and 64 nondelinquent controls ages 12 to 18 years. The delinquents were found to be significantly delayed or arrested in the development of empathy. (Author)

Social development in gifted children is discussed in terms of theories of J. Piaget, D. Taylor, and E. Erikson. Parents need to show children ways that the intellectual disparity between a gifted child and his/her age mates can be compensated for by common bonds. (DB)

The writers of today's adolescent novels show us different teenagers than those written about a generation ago. The major change is in the seriousness of their problems, the teenager's attitudes towards them, and the mood with which the writer treats the situation. (CJ)

Shares childhood experiences from the second, third, and sixth grade in which the author learned about relationships and acceptable behavior according to his peers. (MG)