This is a study of successful youth development in poor, disadvantaged neighborhoods in Denver and Chicago - a study of how children living in the worst neighborhoods develop or fail to develop the values, competencies and commitments that lead to a productive, healthy responsible adult life. While there is a strong focus on neighborhood effects, the study employs a multicontextual model examining both the direct effects of the neighborhood ecology, social organization and contexts embedded in the neighborhood. The unique and combined influence of the neighborhood, family, school, peer group and individual attributes on developmental success is estimated. The view that growing up in a poor, disadvantaged neighborhood condemns one to a life of repeated failure and personal pathology is revealed as a myth, as most youth in these neighborhoods are completing the developmental tasks of adolescence successfully.

Multiple Problem Youth addresses the complex connections among drug abuse, delinquency, and mental health problems as they apply to adolescents and young adults. Interrelationships in this area exist in a vast variety of ways, further complicated by extraneous factors such as demographics, sex, and time. The authors incorporate these factors and analyze the correlations among substance use, delinquency, and mental health problems, as well as discussing developmental patterns and reviewing theories of deviant behavior.

Experts from a range of disciplines use a variety of perspectives, notably those of public health, criminology, ecology, and developmental psychology, to review the latest research on the causes of youth violence. The authors examine the nation's schools and communities and school-based interventions that have prevented or reduced violence. They describe and evaluate strategies for the prevention and treatment of violence that go beyond punishment and incarceration. Violence in American Schools offers a new strategy for the problem of youth violence, arguing that the most effective interventions use a comprehensive, multi-disciplinary approach. This approach takes into account differences in stages of individual development and involvement in overlapping social contexts, families, peer groups, schools, and neighborhoods. This book will be relevant and enlightening to school teachers and administrators, scholars, policy makers, and those who work with young people at risk, as well as by the general reader who is concerned with current social problems.

This is a study of successful youth development in poor, disadvantaged neighborhoods in Denver and Chicago - a study of how children living in the worst neighborhoods develop or fail to develop the values, competencies and commitments that lead to a productive, healthy responsible adult life. While there is a strong focus on neighborhood effects, the study employs a multicontextual model examining both the direct effects of the neighborhood ecology, social organization and contexts embedded in the neighborhood. The unique and combined influence of the neighborhood, family, school, peer group and individual attributes on developmental success is estimated. The view that growing up in a poor, disadvantaged neighborhood condemns one to a life of repeated failure and personal pathology is revealed as a myth, as most youth in these neighborhoods are completing the developmental tasks of adolescence successfully.

Experts from a range of disciplines use a variety of perspectives, notably those of public health, criminology, ecology, and developmental psychology, to review the latest research on the causes of youth violence. The authors examine the nation's schools and communities and school-based interventions that have prevented or reduced violence. They describe and evaluate strategies for the prevention and treatment of violence that go beyond punishment and incarceration. Violence in American Schools offers a new strategy for the problem of youth violence, arguing that the most effective interventions use a comprehensive, multi-disciplinary approach. This approach takes into account differences in stages of individual development and involvement in overlapping social contexts, families, peer groups, schools, and neighborhoods. This book will be relevant and enlightening to school teachers and administrators, scholars, policy makers, and those who work with young people at risk, as well as by the general reader who is concerned with current social problems.