This book presents an integrated and coordinated framework for assessing developmental, psychological, and behavioral disorders in early childhood. Expert contributors advocate for natural-environment methods in addition to standardized measures in assessing academic and social skills as well as age-specific behavior problems in young children. Chapters model collaborations between clinicians, family, and daycare and school personnel, address diagnostic and classification issues, and conceptualize assessment as flexible, ongoing, and, as necessary, leading to coordinated services. The book gives practitioners and researchers critical tools toward establishing best practices in an increasingly complex and important area, leading to better prevention and intervention outcomes. Included in the coverage: Standardized assessment of cognitive development. Authentic and performance-based assessment. The use of Response to Interve ntion (RTI) in early childhood. Collaboration in school and child care settings. Anxiety disorders, PTSD, OCD, and depression in young children. Sleeping, feeding/eating, and attachment problems in early childhood. Early Childhood Assessment in School and Clinical Child Psychology is an essential resource for clinicians and related professionals, researchers, and graduate students in child and school psychology; assessment, testing, and evaluation; occupational therapy; family studies, educational psychology; and speech pathology.

It is with both pride and sadness that we publish the twentieth and last volume of Advances in Clinical Child Psychology. This series has seen a long and successful run starting under the editorship of Ben Lahey and Alan Kazdin, who passed the baton to us at Volume 14. We are grateful to the many contributors over the years and to the Plenum staff for producing a quality product in a timely manner. This volume covers a diverse array of significant topics. In the open ing chapter, Maughan and Rutter explore the research literatures related to continuity and discontinuity of antisocial behavior from childhood to adulthood. Their review and conceptualization emphasize the significance of hyperactivity and inattention, early-onset conduct problems, low reac tivity to stress, and poor peer relations as potentially influential variables in the persistence of antisocial behavior. Social cognitions, environmental continuities, substance abuse, cumulative chains of life events, and protec tive processes are considered as well.

The present volume has been prepared during the International Year of the Child. Designation of a special year devoted to children underscores the widespread recognition of the importance of scientific advances and humane concern over the welfare of children. Clinical child psychology, the topic of the present serial publication, is especially important in recognition of the year of the child. Clinical child psychology at once combines areas of basic and applied research. The subject matter is concerned with understanding the nature of child development and the many influences upon which such development depends. Moreover, the clinical orientation emphasizes the extension of this research to top ics that directly affect the welfare of children and adolescents. Advances in Clinical Child Psychology publishes scholarly reviews and evaluations of many different areas of research and application. In the current volume, the third in the series, a variety of topics are addressed. These include the development of social behavior, the emergence and modification of sex-typed behavior, family systems, self-help proce dures to train parents, assessment of intelligence, childhood obesity, the development and treatment of asthma, pediatric psychology, treatment of severely disturbed children, language development, and education of disadvantaged elementary school students.

The professional development of researchers is critical for the future development ofthe fields of pediatric and clinical child psychology. In order to conduct research in pediatric and clinical child psychology, researchers need to work with a wide range of populations and master an increasingly wide range of skills, many of which are either not formally taught or considered in sufficient depth in clinical training. Such skills include the development of resources for research by writing grants to government agencies and foundations; skills in preparing research for publications concerning original research, review articles, or case reports; scien tific presentation skills; the ability to review and edit scientific manuscripts; and to implement and manage research in applied settings. Moreover, the increasing complexity of research in pediatric and clinical child psychology requires success ful researchers in these fields to develop their expertise with a wide range of new specialized methodologies, data analytic methods, models of data analysis, and methods of assessment. Finally, to enhance the relevance of their research to practice, researchers in pediatric and clinical child psychology need to integrate their work with clinical service delivery programs that are based on empirical research. The necessity to train researchers in pediatric and clinical child psychology in such multifaceted knowledge and skills places extraordinary burdens on profes sional training programs. Professional researchers in pediatric and child clinical psychology also are challenged to develop new knowledge and skills through continuing education and faculty development programs.

What are the advantages - and limitations - of assessing child development from a neuropsychological perspective? Can a better understanding of neuropsychological development in children assist those entering specialized education and supervised training in clinical-child neuropsychology?This engagi.