Foster parents play a pivotal role in the child welfare system. A study that employed focus groups with foster parents was conducted at a private foster care agency with the initial purpose of understanding the characteristics of foster children that foster parents both preferred and not preferred. In the qualitative research tradition, their…

Consistent with the view that adolescent relationships are established in the context of important characteristics of their social networks, we examined the effects of adolescents' experiences of parenting (psychological control and positive monitoring) and of peer aggression and victimization, on their self reports of dating victimization and…

Background: People with intellectual disabilities (ID) have higher levels of health needs compared with the general population, many of which are unrecognised and unmet. While there has been interest and research into the primary health provision for this group, there has been a more limited focus on addressing their care received in general…

Predictive associations between parenting and temperament during the first year of life and child conduct problems were assessed longitudinally in 1,863 offspring of a representative sample of women. Maternal ratings of infant fussiness, activity level, predictability, and positive affect each independently predicted maternal ratings of conduct…

Research Findings: Child care delivery practices promoting continuous, primary caregiver-child relationships (relationship-focused child care) were evaluated for 223 preschool-age children (45% African American, 55% Latino) attending child care centers serving low-income children. Both relationship-focused and non-relationship-focused centers were…

Objective: The construct of empathy was examined in 20 boys with gender identity disorder (GID), 20 clinical control boys with externalizing disorders (ECC), 20 community control boys (NCB), and 20 community control girls (NCG). The mean age of the children was 6.86 years (range = 4-8 years). It was hypothesized that boys with GID would show…

Through a national questionnaire, 3 case studies of Local Educational Authorities (LEAs), and additional case studies of 38 children, this national study examined primary school exclusion. This document focuses on national level data. Findings included that: (1) other metropolitan LEAs had about twice the number of exclusions as London and as…

This exploratory study sought to identify: (1) parents' representations of children's need for support; (2) the nature and frequency of the support that parents believe they have given their child; and (3) the differences between the representations of parents whose child has behavior problems and those of parents of children without behavior…

Problem behavior may be defined as behavior that is socially defined as a problem, a source of concern, or as undesirable by the norms of conventional society and the institutions of adult authority, and its occurrence usually elicits some kind of social control response. Key elements of problem behavior are: (1) problem behaviors are rare until…

Ways in which schools can handle student discipline problems are described in this Digest, which asserts that effective strategies aim to encourage responsible behavior and provide all students with a satisfying school experience. The document outlines the school characteristics associated with discipline problems, examines ways to decrease…

Attributions for students described in case studies as exhibiting immature, unmanageable, or perceptually-delayed behaviors in the classroom were provided by 174 regular education elementary school teachers. The teachers' attributions for the students' difficulties were primarily "other-directed"; student or home factors were most often…

Guidelines are offered for dealing with noncompliant behavior in severely handicapped students. Eight steps in developing interventions for such behaviors are listed, and three are dealt with in detail: defining noncompliance, establishing causes for non compliance, and providing a number of interventions for each cause. Noncompliance is viewed…

Acceptability of classroom interventions for behavior problems was assessed by having 180 preservice and student teachers read case studies involving intervention and then judged the intervention's acceptability by completing the Intervention Rating Profile, an assessment instrument designed to evaluate acceptability of an intervention in terms of…

Examines five basic questions: How is obedience behavior learned? What are the differences between rational and irrational obedience? What has research taught about the dynamics of obedience behavior? How can rational obedience be encouraged? What are the implications for teachers and parents? (Author/IRT)

This article describes step-by-step procedures used by a counselor in approaching a problem with a particular problem student. (Author)