Caregivers of children with autism spectrum disorder are vulnerable to overstated benefits of interventions, and such overstatements are common with interventions involving animals. This response to Wright, Hall, Hames, Hardmin, Mills, the Paws Team, and Mills' (2015) article, "Acquiring a Pet Dog Significantly Reduces Stress of Primary…

Homework is a reality in the lives of most American school children. At its best, homework is a highly useful and appropriate strategy. At its worst, it can wreak havoc in the lives of many children and families who fail to master behavioral and environmental routines that create conditions and patterns conducive for optimal performance. Thus,…

Criticizes claims in "The Bell Curve" that a high value for heritability of intelligence constrains the extent to which environmental changes can increase intelligence. Cites adoption studies and the increasing intelligence of successive cohorts of U.S. children as evidence that intelligence can increase substantially without heroic…

This paper, which introduces the theme issue, examines the concept of children "at risk" and proposes a framework which includes not only risk but also opportunity factors in child behavior and development. A table presents 30 variables influencing human development and functioning, with associated risk and opportunity factors. (DB)

Economic level, home environment and culture are factors associated with economic discrepancies between disadvantaged and advantaged groups. Intervention, in the form of parent and infant training programs and compensatory education, can improve students' chances of academic success if it incorporates the components of early intervention and…

This article highlights key features of Multisystemic Therapy (MST), a treatment designed to empower caregivers with the skills and resources needed to address behavioral problems and to teach coping skills to youth. The supervisory, consultation, and program practices that support therapist implementation of MST in community-based settings are…

Examines the likelihood of children and families being resilient in the face of poverty and its associated risks. Discusses findings from the resilience research literature and provides some recommendations regarding Head Start. Suggests that competence and confidence can flourish even under adverse conditions, if children are provided with a…

Serious delinquent behavior may be part of a disabling and durable condition that consists of multiple antisocial and dysfunctional behaviors, often runs in families, and eludes effective short-term treatment. The socializing influence of long-term supportive family treatment is discussed as a therapeutic alternative. (Author/JW)

In this presentation, made to the White House Conference on Character and Community, the author advocates creating a preventive intervention system for chronic violence; that scientific research supports this system; that it is cost-beneficial to do so; and that it is necessary in order to help the next generation become productive citizens. He…

Examines the recent history of early childhood intervention efforts; discusses principles that guided the formation of intervention programs in the 1960s and 1970s; describes the Head Start program and lessons learned from its development; considers issues in evaluating intervention programs; and presents suggestions for future directions in early…

Key components of human behavioral genetics and Sandra Scarr's work of the past two decades are critically reviewed based on scholarship in animal neuropsychology and clinical and educational psychology. Scarr's opinion that interventions to enhance intellectual development are ineffectual for children from abuse- and neglect-free backgrounds is…

Takes the position, contrary to that of Sandra Scarr, that the details of socialization patterns are crucial to an understanding of normal and deviant development. Research is cited to support the argument that better than adequate parenting optimizes the development of both normal and vulnerable children and that parents' belief in their own…

It is imperative that effective preparation and training strategies for future early childhood personnel, teachers, social workers, and health practitioners be established so that low-income, high-risk, multiproblem families can be adequately served. Effective programs and services for such families are family-centered, neighborhood-based,…

Although the nation has been focused on improving its schools for more than a decade, the achievement gap between children from low-income households and those from more affluent households persists. Recognizing the close relationship between education and other supports and services for children, families, and communities, this book is designed…

In this article, the author describes the two types of street children: (1) those children whose vagrancy was forced upon them by families and circumstances; and (2) those children who have an urge to go wandering, not because they are unhappy and have been abused but because they have an urge for it. Even though these children do run away from…