Non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) is a growing concern among professionals working with youth. Recent studies exploring the occurrence of NSSI in middle and high schools indicate that 15% to 20% of students will admit to having engaged in this behavior at least once. The alarming number of adolescents engaging in NSSI poses a challenge to all…

Aggressive and destructive behaviors are an ongoing challenge for many children, adolescents, and adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities (I/DD). What's behind these high-risk behaviors, and how can professionals help manage them? Discover the answers in this comprehensive text, the most up-to-date compendium of knowledge on…

There is a very substantial literature over the past 50 years on the advantages of early detection and intervention on the cognitive, communicative, and social-emotional development of infants and toddlers at risk for developmental delay due to premature birth or social disadvantage. Most of these studies excluded children with severe delays or…

Physical interventions for special education students in crisis remains a controversial concept. The first minute of a crisis situation represents the most crucial time to prevent injury or the exacerbation of injury. Although preventing violence and escalation of negative emotions is the first step in crisis management, school staff also must be…

This article offers a guide for using the Safe Kit when working with clients who self-injure. The Safe Kit can be used as a supplement to more traditional approaches to counseling and offers clients alternatives to self-injury when they need alternatives the most. The Safe Kit works under the assumption that individuals differ in the meaning they…

The assessment of maintaining variables with the goal of developing prosocial intervention plans has become a driving force in the intellectual disabilities (ID) literature. One particularly crucial variable is whether the behavior is low or high rate and whether the challenging behavior is best characterized by self-injury or aggression. Because…

The article relates to the author's former experiences gained during the work with individuals with developmental disabilities at the Association for the Help of Retarded Children, Nassau Chapter in New York State in the United States (US), as well as with autistic children at the Loddon School in Hampshire County in the United Kingdom (UK).…

We describe a procedure for differentiating among potential precursor responses for use in a functional analysis. Conditional probability analysis of descriptive assessment data identified three potential precursors. Results from the indirect assessment corresponded with those obtained from the descriptive assessment. The top-ranked response…

Suicide is a serious public health problem that causes immeasurable pain, suffering, and loss to individuals, families, and communities nationwide. Many people may be surprised to learn that suicide was one of the top 10 causes of death in the United States in 2009. And death is only the tip of the iceberg. For every person who dies by suicide,…

While awareness of non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) appears to be increasing among school counselors, social workers, nurses, and others who work with youth, it remains one of the most difficult behaviors to encounter, with few professionals feeling well equipped to handle these situations. This introductory article aims to define NSSI, describe…

This report summarizes data contributed to Center for Collegiate Mental Health (CCMH) during the 2012-2013 academic year, closing on June 30, 2013. Data was contributed by 132 college and university counseling centers describing more than 95,00 unique college students seeking mental health treatment, 3,000 clinicians, and over 500,000…

Concern about the prevalence of nonsuicidal self-injury is widespread. Members of an electronic listserv for college counseling center directors nationwide were invited to participate in a Web survey to investigate provider experience with nonsuicidal self-injury; 290 surveys were analyzed. Most respondents perceived recent increases in…

Single-case experimental designs (SCEDs) provide a time- and cost-effective alternative to randomized clinical trials and offer significant advantages in terms of internal and external validity. A brief history and primer on SCEDs is provided, specifically for use in suicide intervention research. Various SCED methodologies, such as AB, ABAB,…

The neurobiology of borderline personality disorder (BPD) remains unclear. Dysfunctions of several neurobiological systems, including serotoninergic, dopaminergic, and other neurotransmitter systems, have been discussed. Here we present a theory that alterations in the sensitivity of opioid receptors or the availability of endogenous opioids…

Intersectionality takes into account how inequalities of race, gender, class, and sexuality "intersect," or work in combined ways, in the lives of Black women and other women of color. As a holistic teaching approach, it also has relevance for all people, male and female, straight and gay, rich and poor, and along the various continuums…