Part I of this curriculum guide outlines six workshop sessions. The instructional materials included were designed to support single parents as they identify and confront problems with which they and their children must cope. Some of the topics addressed are the need to help single parents begin to think of and see themselves as individuals as…

The newsletter offers perspectives on the provision of family support services for families with disabled members. An introductory article by Madeleine Will, Assistant Secretary for Special Education and Rehabilitative Services, stresses the impressive coping skills exhibited by many such families and their relationship to service professionals.…

This paper describes stepfamily life; much of its content is derived from responses of 29 Australian couples who attended a six-session educational program on living in a stepfamily and who completed pre- and post-tests on marital adjustment and self-esteem plus a weekly problem rating scale. While the major part of the study was concerned with…

Records (1972-1982) showing documentation of abuse or neglect in 95 developmentally disabled children were examined. Information was gathered on the children's functioning level, family income, involvement of communiy services, sibling abuse, and family's general lifestyle. Results indicated that in almost every case, the families experienced…

ISFAR (Intensive Services to Families at Risk Project), a program designed to prevent foster care among children at risk for placement because of documented or suspected abuse or neglect, is described, and its effectiveness evaluated. ISFAR's staffing patterns, guiding philosophy of helping parents become more adequate in their interaction with…

The family is the primary source of support and caregiving for the frail, dependent elder, providing emotional support, logistical services, supplemental finances, and the link to the outside community for the homebound elder. The caregiving systems of 84 of Texas's Adult Protective Services' (APS) cases were examined. The definition of neglect…

In spite of the growing awareness and development of respite services, many families in need of them have little or no access. This is especially true for families whose children have emotional handicaps. A rationale for respite services supports parents' entitlement to respite care, its importance to all family members, and its help in improving…

Alzheimer's disease is an insidious, progressively destructive brain disease which leads to the loss of judgment, communication skills, and psychomotor control preventing the victim from living independently. The consequences of caring for victims include emotional, physical, and familial strain as the caregiver is faced with the progressive…

The idea of family is being rediscovered in the 1980s. By no means coincidentally, industrial economies throughout the western world have been experiencing serious contraction. Quebec's 1984 working paper on family policy, "For Quebec Families," is illustrative of one government's rediscovery of family by means of the appropriation of…

Divorce and remarriage may pose special problems for the grandparent-child-grandchild relationship. The kinship relationships after divorce have not been institutionalized; there are not generally accepted forms of behavior. To examine the role of grandmothers in the divorce of their children, 50 parent-grandmother pairs were interviewed. The…

America's children and their families are in trouble, trouble so deep as to constitute a serious threat to the future of our society. The major source of that threat is bureaucratic "benign neglect." We have failed to recognize that the problems of the multitroubled family in a changing society are the problems of the entire society in the midst…

This paper examines a case study of family play therapy in Israel. The unique contributions of play therapy are evaluated including the therapy's accessibility to young children, its richness and flexibility, its exposure of covert patterns, its wealth of therapeutic means, and its therapeutic economy. The systematization of the therapy attempts…

Transcribed audiotapes were analyzed to identify themes and patterns of perception in the opinions of 24 working mothers who discussed their employment, child care arrangements, and families. Parents in four discussion groups spoke freely. Their comments are reported in sections focusing on parents' choice of child care arrangements, methods used…

Using wife battering as a representative presenting problem, this paper presents an interactional, systematic framework of the therapist's management of clients who are involved in life-threatening situations, e.g., cases including suicidal threats, drug abuse, alcoholism, or child or spouse abuse. Several linear-causal theories of addressing…

The development of behavioral parent training research and changes that have taken place in the field over the past 20 years are reviewed. The author describes the evolution according to three phases. Phase 1, Early Work-Child Focus (1960-1970), is seen to have emphasized the analysis of child behavior change. Phase 2, Mid-Period--Parent Focus…