Describes the Summer Treatment Program (STP), a comprehensive sports training and treatment program for students with Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder. STP incorporates social-skills training, academic instruction, parent training, and medication evaluation. STP has been shown to be highly successful and its principles can be transferred…

Using a socio-ecological perspective, examines the influences of adolescents' social networks, personal resources, and environmental risks on adolescents' behavior problems across three samples of youth (N=155). Findings show that social support can operate as a protective agent or as a risk factor, depending on other characteristics of subsystems…

This article describes characteristics of individuals with Asperger Syndrome, a developmental disability defined by impairments in social relationships and verbal and nonverbal communication and by restrictive, repetitive patterns of behavior, interests, and activities. Diagnostic criteria, essential features of the disability, and other notable…

Describes and reviews the work of researchers who have operationalized the construct of friendship and the theoretical basis for the association between friendship experiences and children's level of psychological adjustment. Details study of how various levels of friendship constructs relate to one another and to children's loneliness and…

Discusses the benefits of students participating in art classes, focusing on the development of students. Explains that art education: (1) fosters a joy of learning; (2) supports intellectual, emotional, and social growth; (3) prepares leaders of the future; and (4) inspires students. (SM)

A community-based social-learning program that combined behavior modification with cognitive intervention was used to help an adult male with a history of aggressive, antisocial behavior develop self-management skills. Results showed a significant decline in physical and nonphysical aggression, allowing the man to maintain competitive employment…

Examined the mental health and psychosocial development of 58 Guatemalan Mayan children living in 2 refugee camps in the Mexican state of Chiapas. Found only minimal evidence of psychological trauma among the children and a positive relationship between children's mental health and the health status (physical and mental) of their mothers. (MDM)

Reviews research on friendships of delinquents and nondelinquents. Contrasting theories and research have pointed to both the distinctiveness of delinquent friendships and the commonality with normal friendships. Greater conflict, poorer attachment quality, lesser ability to repair relationships, cognitive distortions, and poorer social-cognitive…

Children's ideas strongly shape classroom life in Japanese elementary schools. Japanese children identify goals for self-improvement, work hard to achieve them, and then choose new goals. Events like the Yotsubashi Festival are not diversions from the curriculum, but designed to help children develop socially, emotionally, ethically, and…

The Social Awareness Inventory (SAI), which assesses individual differences in eight social-perceptual styles, is introduced and applied in three studies. The model is derived by crossing the three binary dimensions of target (self or other), perspective (own or other's), and content (overt appearance or covert experience). The SAI appears to…

Formal schooling generally does not include education in interpersonal and intrapersonal skills, although helping children develop socially and emotionally is important in academic progress. Describes the implementation of a social skills training program for elementary and middle school students called Connecting with Others: Lessons for Teaching…

States that Zionist national identity in Israel today is split between a liberal, secular, Post-Zionist civic identity and an ethnic, religious, Neo-Zionist nationalistic identity. Describes the historical underpinnings of the two mutually antagonistic identities and reflects upon how each affects the perceptions of the boundaries of the…

Reports that the educational experience of Israeli Jews from Islamic countries (Mizrahi Jews) demonstrates the struggle between egalitarian rhetoric (a critical multiculturalism with a social-democratic character) on one hand and a practice of segregation (an autonomist multiculturalism with fundamentalist features) on the other. (Contains 78 end…

In the last two decades, the Israeli educational system has transformed from a state controlled and financed bureaucratic system into a decentralized, partly locally controlled, and increasingly privately financed system. Argues that these changes cater to the educational interest of middle and upper middle classes and undermine the principle of…

Discusses nine works of young adult fiction that address themes of standing up for others as well as for one's true self, of daring to be different, and of finding the courage to go against the tide. Considers use of the books in small group and classroom discussions. (JPB)