The Minnesota Longitudinal Study of Risk and Adaptation, a 45-year study of children born into poverty, offers a number of lessons for practitioners. Among these are the potency of early relationship experiences for predicting developmental outcomes and the fate of early experience following developmental change. This article describes the…

Children from birth to 3 years old with complex medical needs often experience psychological issues, but there are limited services and supports to meet their needs. To bridge this gap, the authors created the Pediatric Birth to Three Clinic and Early Childhood Mental Health Program at the University of Minnesota. They describe the toxic stress…

Children who are adopted at an older age through foster care and those adopted from overseas orphanages are at high risk for behavioral and emotional distress. This important manual presents a structured, evidence-based protocol for providing mental health treatment to families adopting vulnerable children. Drawing on their extensive clinical…

Many children, especially those from lower-income families, face considerable instability early in their lives. This may include changes in family structure, irregular family routines, frequent moves, fluctuating daycare arrangements, and noisy, crowded, or generally chaotic environments. Moreover, instability and chaos affect young children's…

Because college students who have accomplished developmental tasks less effectively may be at risk for detrimental behavior such as binge eating, we examined emotion regulation as a mediator of attachment insecurity and binge eating. Based on undergraduate and graduate student responses to a Web-based survey ("N" = 381), structural…

This article presents an overview of the Healthy Steps for Young Children (Healthy Steps) program at Montefiore Medical Center, in the Bronx, NY. The authors review the theoretical underpinnings of this national program for the promotion of early childhood mental health. The Healthy Steps program at Montefiore is integrated into outpatient…

The social justice issue of human sex trafficking is a global form of oppression that places men, women and children at risk for sexual exploitation. Although a body of research exists on the topics of human trafficking, literature specific to the mental health implications for counselors working with this population is limited. Counselors should…

Children's exposure to violence is a national crisis. The high prevalence of exposure to violence in infancy and early childhood has implications for lifelong health and development because early experiences are most influential in shaping the structure and functioning of the brain, the quality of attachments and other relationships, and the…

A disruption in the initial attachment formed between an infant and a primary caregiver often leads to some type of disordered or disorganized attachment. While research has been conducted on the etiology, symptoms, and effective forms of therapy regarding this disorder, much definitive information remains unknown or unclear. With the increasing…

Self-regulation lays the foundation for positive social relationships and academic success. In this article, we provide an overview of self-regulation and the key terms related to selfregulation, such as executive function. We discuss research on how self-regulation develops and connections between self-regulation and social and academic outcomes.…

Infancy is a time of extreme opportunity, but it is also a time of extreme vulnerability, particularly for those reared in high-risk environments. Although infant exposure to any risk is important to understand, this brief focuses on the experience and impact of "trauma," defined as witnessing or experiencing an event that poses a real…

The concept of "space" has been used in youth care parlance to describe how and where relational care with youth takes place. Interpersonal space is central to child and youth care practice. It is the realm in which helping adults work to engage and connect with a youth. Unconditional space is designed around the "needs" of the…

The Parent-Child Psychotherapy Program (PPP) is a multifamily group therapy intervention for parents and young children at high risk for intergenerational patterns of neglect, abuse, and disorganized attachment. A "developmental and experiential model" that incorporates principles of attachment theory, the PPP addresses parent and child needs…

Because most research on military families has focused on children who are old enough to go to school, we know the least about the youngest and perhaps most vulnerable children in these families. Some of what we do know, however, is worrisome--for example, multiple deployments, which many families have experienced during the wars in Iraq and…

As the title suggests, it will be suggested in this paper that attachment is a useful concept and that attachment disorders need to be addressed for infants and children to develop into responsible, caring, and mature adults for whom the everyday ability to learn from experience and adapt appropriately to an ever changing world. There will be no…