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Youth mentoring interventions are often designed with the intention of promoting improved outcomes among marginalized youth. Despite their promise to reduce inequality through the provision of novel opportunities and increased social capital to marginalized youth, youth mentoring interventions hold the potential to reproduce rather than reduce inequality. In the current review, we explore literature on youth mentoring that has incorporated a social justice lens. We conclude that there is a need for greater attention to principles of social justice in the design, implementation, and evaluation of youth mentoring interventions. After reviewing the literature, we make recommendations for research and practice based on a social justice perspective and explore alternatives to traditional youth mentoring that may allow for better alignment with social justice principles.

Background Juvenile Dermatomyositis is a rare, potentially life-threatening condition with no known cure. There is no published literature capturing how children and young people feel about their condition, from their perspective. This study was therefore unique in that it asked children and young people what is it like to live with Juvenile Dermatomyositis. Methods Data were obtained from fifteen young people with Juvenile Dermatomyositis, between eight and nineteen years of age from one Paediatric Rheumatology department using audio-recorded interpretive phenomenology interviews. Data were analyzed phenomenologically, using a process that derives narratives from transcripts resulting in a collective composite of participants shared experiences, called a ‘phenomenon’. Results The overarching metaphor of a rollercoaster captures the phenomenon of living with Juvenile Dermatomyositis as a young person, with the ups and downs at different time points clearly described by those interviewed. The five themes plotted on the rollercoaster, began with confusion; followed by feeling different, being sick, steroidal and scared from the medications; uncertainty; and then ended with acceptance of the disease over time. Conclusion Young people were able to talk about their experiences about having Juvenile Dermatomyositis. Our findings will aid clinicians in their practice by gaining a deeper understanding of what daily life is like and highlighting ways to enhance psychosocial functioning. Hopefully, this study and any further resulting studies, will raise understanding of Juvenile Dermatomyositis worldwide and will encourage health care professionals to better assess psychosocial needs in the future.

This beautifully illustrated therapeutic storybook has been designed to support children and families to strengthen their relationships using solution-focused brief therapy. Healthy and supportive family relationships are essential to mental health, and as referrals to Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services continue to rise, growing research demonstrates the benefit of involving families in the treatment of children and young people facing emotional and mental health difficulties. The storybook explores the struggles faced by a typical family in which relationships have become more tense and conflictual. It can be used to spark discussion about the struggles faced by a family, and the ways in which these struggles can be overcome when they work together. This book features: An engaging story with attractive illustrations, enabling difficult issues to be explored in a child-friendly manner An accessible and relateable narrative that allows for a discussion of family difficulties without assigning blame Several suggestions for practical steps that can be taken to allow happiness to return to a family. This is a vital resource for social workers, counsellors, mental health professionals and individual and family psychotherapists working with families and children. Also available is an accompanying workbook with resources and activities: When Happiness Had a Holiday: Helping Families Improve and Strengthen their Relationships: A Professional Resource.

Despite growing trends in adolescent female aggression, much adolescent aggression research has focused on males to the exclusion of their female counterparts. Using relational-cultural and social role theories, the current study identifies the risk and promotive factors associated with adolescent female aggression. Using data from the Rural Adaptation Project (a 5 year longitudinal panel study of youth from two rural, ethnically diverse, low income counties in North Carolina), a 2-level hierarchical linear model was estimated (N = 3580). Internalizing symptoms, association with delinquent friends, peer pressure, and parent–child conflict emerged as risk factors whereas teacher support was a significant promotive factor. Results suggest that interventions should focus on negative relationships in both the parent and peer domains and underscore the need for mental health services for aggressive girls.

The dearth of research literature on the religious beliefs and practices of African American adolescents has led to increased empirical inquiry, yet a lack of research considers African American adolescents’ religious beliefs and practices as an important developmental milestone. This study explored how African American parents’ religious socialization affected youth religious experiences and served as a culturally specific strength-based asset that promotes psychological well-being. Our sample included a socioeconomically diverse sample of 154 African American families. Accounting for demographics, adolescents’ relationship and communication with God were found to be associated with a healthier psychological well-being. Additionally, parents’ religious socialization impacted the relationship between youths religious beliefs and practice and psychological well-being. Overall, results suggest that parents’ and adolescents’ religious beliefs can promote psychological well-being.

Much has been written about the tremendous risks faced by children who do not live with or who are not cared for by their parents. Similarly, existing literature warns of the less than optimal child outcomes associated with kinship care, given that caregivers themselves can be vulnerable because of their advanced age, health difficulties, lack of resources, and fragile living conditions. Still, research has demonstrated the beneficial effect of kinship care on children. However, little is known about what produces these observed positive effects. In this empirical analysis of kinship caregivers (N = 747) and children (N = 1301), researchers sought to determine the protective factors that mediate against risks and produce optimal levels of child well-being for children being cared for by kinship caregivers. Although the findings are preliminary, such aspects as low income, high stress, caring for children who have special needs, and caring for multiple children, long thought to place children at risk for poor outcomes while under the care of relatives, can be mediated by protective factors (e.g., readiness/capacity, childrearing/parenting skills, motivation/sustainability, and family involvement/support) that kinship caregivers may inherently possess. This finding supports a strengths-based orientation associated with the contextual distinctions of kinship care. Based on the findings, direct practice and clinical support strategies designed to assess and enhance caregivers’ protective factors are discussed. Moreover, policy and research implications are offered that can stimulate investigation of kinship care’s restorative benefit.

Equips early intervention providers with strategies for supporting families to facilitate critical skills for young children with autism or with characteristics of autism during typical everyday routines and activities. Focuses on those skills particularly challenging for this population, e.g., regulation, flexibility, social communication.

Research conducted over the past decade indicates that a wide range of psychological and interpersonal problems are more prevalent among those who have been sexually abused than among individuals with no such experiences. Although a definitive causal relationship between such difficulties and sexual abuse cannot be established using current retrospective research methodologies, the aggregate of consistent findings in this literature has led many to conclude that childhood sexual abuse is a major risk factor for a variety of problems. This article summarizes what is currently known about these potential impacts of child sexual abuse. The various problems and symptoms described in the literature on child sexual abuse are reviewed in a series of broad categories including posttraumatic stress, cognitive distortions, emotional pain, avoidance, an impaired sense of self, and interpersonal difficulties. Research has demonstrated that the extent to which a given individual manifests abuse-related distress is a function of an undetermined number of abuse-specific variables, as well as individual and environmental factors that existed prior to, or occurred subsequent to, the incidents of sexual abuse.

The prevention of aggressive and delinquent behavior during childhood and adolescence is one of the highest priorities for public health and crime prevention. The most common approach to preventing or treating these conduct problems has been to provide interpersonal skills training to the affected youth. This paper reviews all randomized controlled trials evaluating interpersonal skills training programs as an intervention to reduce conduct problems. Research shows that such programs have weak empirical support as isolated interventions. An alternative evidence-based system of care is described. Such a system would include behavioral parent training and behavioral classroom-based interventions for young children at risk of developing problems, as well as multisystemic family therapy or multidimensional treatment foster care for chronic delinquents. Within such a network of services, interpersonal skills training could play an important supportive role. Such a system holds the greatest promise for reducing the prevalence of aggressive and delinquent behavior in communities.