Decades of research have demonstrated that the parent-child dyad and the environment of the familyâ€"which includes all primary caregiversâ€"are at the foundation of children's well- being and healthy development. From birth, children are learning and rely on parents and the other caregivers in their lives to protect and care for them. The impact of parents may never be greater than during the earliest years of life, when a child's brain is rapidly developing and when nearly all of her or his experiences are created and shaped by parents and the family environment. Parents help children build and refine their knowledge and skills, charting a trajectory for their health and well-being during childhood and beyond. The experience of parenting also impacts parents themselves. For instance, parenting can enrich and give focus to parents' lives; generate stress or calm; and create any number of emotions, including feelings of happiness, sadness, fulfillment, and anger. Parenting of young children today takes place in the context of significant ongoing developments. These include: a rapidly growing body of science on early childhood, increases in funding for programs and services for families, changing demographics of the U.S. population, and greater diversity of family structure. Additionally, parenting is increasingly being shaped by technology and increased access to information about parenting. Parenting Matters identifies parenting knowledge, attitudes, and practices associated with positive developmental outcomes in children ages 0-8; universal/preventive and targeted strategies used in a variety of settings that have been effective with parents of young children and that support the identified knowledge, attitudes, and practices; and barriers to and facilitators for parents' use of practices that lead to healthy child outcomes as well as their participation in effective programs and services. This report makes recommendations directed at an array of stakeholders, for promoting the wide-scale adoption of effective programs and services for parents and on areas that warrant further research to inform policy and practice. It is meant to serve as a roadmap for the future of parenting policy, research, and practice in the United States.

From Simon & Schuster, Crime & Human Nature is the definitive study of the causes of crime. Assembling the latest evidence from the fields of sociology, criminology, economics, medicine, biology, and psychology and exploring the effects of such factors as gender, age, race, and family, two eminent social scientists frame a groundbreaking theory of criminal behavior.

Although many books are written about bereavement, very few are written about the fear of one's own death and most of these focus chiefly on terminal illness. In contrast, this book looks at the ways in which the fear of death operates on a back burner throughout our lives and how it influences the choices we make and the paths that we follow in life. The author presents a `moral hierarchy' of behavior used in coping with the fear of death and dying.

Criminal science can best be conceptualized as the holistic and interdisciplinary study of crime and criminals. All major features of criminal development are taken into account, and all sources of data (including medical, legal, sociological, ecological, and psychological) are considered. Criminal scientists center their investigative energies on the individual offender, cognizant that this individual is part of a wider system of interacting physical, social, and psychological influences. Presented in two volumes, this tome explores the complex interplay of variables that give rise to criminal outcomes. Volume 1 considers knowledge development as represented by research examining the contextual, empirical, and theoretical foundations of crime. Building on knowledge reviewed in the first volume, Volume 2 addresses the issue of knowledge utilization. Assessment, prediction, classification, intervention, prevention, and several other categories of application science are featured. The author addresses ways in which society can inspire pro-social behavior and criminal offenders can find noncriminal solutions to their problems--something that is in the best interests of both groups. This book will be of great value to criminologists and students of criminology/criminal justice, as well as behavioral scientists and law enforcement officials.