Chronic illness, such as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, has a major impact on the sociol, emotional, and educational well-being of the young people affected by it. Many students are either absent from school for prolonged periods or able to attend for only a few classes each week. Students have identified the importance of educational strategies in the management of their illness. If the school or educational setting is functioning appropriately, then social, emotional, developmental, and academic issues associated with chronic illness gradually resolve. A program developed in conjunction with the Victorian Visiting Teacher Service is described. Strategies used to assist housebound students, their carers, teaching staff, and students who are gradually returning to school are outlined.

Child and youth anxiety are the most common problem experienced during the school years. We know that we can effectively treat and prevent childhood anxiety by using individual, group, and community-based interventions that involve parents, peers, and educators. Recent research has shown that children who experience anxiety often develop depression in adolescence. Therefore, it is important to disseminate anxiety Intervention strategies both for the prevention of anxiety and, in the longer term, of depression Problems. Australia is a leading country in the development, evaluation, and Implementation ofsuch strategies. This paper describes, in detail, a community-based Intervention program.

The initial interview is an important aspect of development of and intervention in tertiary student learning. Yet there are no published interview schedules available to psychologists working in the area of tertiary academic skills development This paper presents an interview schedule for use with individual tertiary students seeking assistance with learning and academic skills development. Some preliminary comments about the application of the schedule are also offered.

Anxiety disorders are the most common form of psychopathology reported by children and adolescents and significantly affect a child's ability to deal with normal developmental challenges. Fortunately, the efficacy of cognitive-behavioural interventions with anxmus children and adolescents has been clearly demonstrated. Most recently, however, treatment outcome research in this area has demonstrated the relative superiority of cognitive-behavioural interventions involving the family as well as the anxious child. Through the Child and Adolescent Anxiety Project at the University of Queensland, an integrated intervention involving a parent-focused component (the “Do as I Do” program) and a child-focused component (the “Facing your Fears” program) has been developed and is currently being evaluated. The present paper outlmes the type of research conducted within the Child and Adolescent Anxiety Project, the need for intervention in childhood anxiety, the treatment outcome data on which the development of this integrated intervention has been based, the content of each session in the intervention, and clinical observations and reflections made by clinicians involved in the administration of the intervention.

Increasing psychological resilience in young people can prevent the development of depression. The model of adolescent depression underlying the Resourceful Adolescent Project (RAP) suggests that adolescent depression and suicide result from a combination of some or all of three interrelating factors: (a) deficits in adolescent psychological wellbeing and coping resources; (b) escalating or chronic family conflict; and (c) depressive adolescent thoughts, feelings, and behaviour. Each element of this model suggests discrete aspects of the overall prevention and early Intervention strategy used in RAP. This overview of the activities of RAP outlines the need for the project, the benefits of early Intervention in preventing adolescent depression, and the empirical and theoretical bases of the programs used in the project. The programs for adolescents and for their parents, their efficacy, and future directions of RAP are also described.

Body dissatisfaction and eating disorders in the preadolescent population have increased over the past 10 years. The Eating and Me (E&M) scale of body dissatisfaction and disordered eating for use with prepubescent males and females (Sands, Tricker, Sherman, Armatas, & Maschette, 1997) was refined and used to investigate relationships among disordered eating, body dissatisfaction, and self-worth. The sample comprised 59 females and 57 males, with ages ranging between 10-12 years (M = 11 years). From the 18 item E&M-II, 6 items were removed to produce the 12-item E&M-III scale. Physical self-worth, current and ideal images, and Children’s Eating Attitude Test scores predicted high scores on the E&M-III. These results support the inclusion of body image assessment in screening for preclinical eating disturbances in nonclinical populations.

Schools are an important setting for identification of children with mental health Problems, for referral to specialist mental health Professionals, and for preventive interventions. To ensure optimal Provision of mental health interventions, it is necessary understand how school Systems already identify and support such students. Focus groups with 77 teachers, guidance officers, and school principals in southeast Queensland explored how these school personnel perceive their students’ mental health difficulties. The eight groups identified existing child mental health problems and were aware of a number of early signs of mental health problems. Participants expressed concerns that children with internalising problems were not receiving appropriate Services, and they identified several barriers to effective communication with families and within the education sector. There are implications for the development of evidence-based approaches in the primary and secondary prevention of mental health problems in children.

This study identified selected perinatal and neonatal variables that place ELBW children at particularly high risk for cognitive delay. Forty children weighing less than 1000 grams (ELBW) at birth underwent developmentol assessment at 9 and 18 months on the Bayley II Mental Development lndex (MDI). Decline in MDI scores between these two ages was evident for infants under 26 weeks gestation at birth as well as for children categorised with an impairment (outcome categories I and II). At 9 months, MDI scores were significantly lower for children with chronic lung disease, for those who required formal developmental intervention, and for those hospitalised for respiratory problems. At 18 months, cognitive scores were significantly lower for children on four variables: gestational age less than 26 weeks; semi-skilled, unskilled, unemployed parents (levels 5 and 6); formal intervention; and admission to hospital for respiratory illness. Greater emphasis on intervention for these at-risk variables is recommended.

Drawing on Plumert’s (1995) findings that children exhibit an optimism bios in their gross motor performance expectations compored with adults, this study tested the hypothesis that younger children are more likely to overestimate their gross motor performance compared with older children. Participants were 6-year-old and 11-year-old children. The accuracy of children’s estimates of their motor performance was assessed using four tasks (horizontal reach, vertical reach, clearance, and stepping), which were adjusted to either well-within, just-within, just-beyond, or well-beyond each child’s individual abilities. Results confirmed that the 6-year-olds significantly overestimated their motor performance compared with 11-year-olds. The discussion focuses upon the ecological validity of these findings, as well as the implications for children’s motor confidence and motor development.

The Australian Educational and Developmental Psychologist (AEDP) has been in continuous publication for 15 years.This paper describes the history of this publication and presents some interesting facts and figures about the topics, the authors, and the Journal itself over the past 15 years. Some reflections and reminiscences add a personal flavour and Interpretation to the facts.

This exploratory study investigated factors influencing psychologists’ decisions to report child abuse. Sixty Victorian psychologists, most of whom had experience with alleged child abuse situations, completed a questionnaire that presented vignettes in which a father denied abusing his daughter. The father's level of denial was varied between angry denial with no acknowledgment of any problems and denial combined with acknowledging problems existed. After each vignette, the psychologists answered questions relating to the incident and general questions dealing with reporting of child abuse. Participants were more likely to report in the vignette when the father angrily denied the abuse as compared to denial with an acknowledgment that problems existed. In deciding whether abuse had occurred, psychologists gave most weight to their confidence that she was being abused. Psychologists who had reported an actual case of child abuse were more likely to report in the hypothetical situation. Generally, respondents supported the introduction of mandatory reporting of child abuse, although some expressed concerns about the quality of community services in this area.

The results of research into patterns of change and stability in water conservation are used to draw attention to some potentially important questions for prosocial teaching in schools. The patterns emerged from a main study measuring three rounds of responses from 2,600 urban, primary and secondary students and their parents and teachers in cross-sectional and longitudinal samples over seven years and from a similar, four-year, comparative study of 600 participants in a regional area. The results tracked water conservation knowledge, attitudes, intentions, and behaviour as well as sources of information and persuasion that participants considered to have been influential in bringing them to their current level of water conservation. Similar patterns of change and stability prevailed across all data sets in both studies. Changes in student behaviour were minimally related to knowledge. Changes were best explained in two ways: stable, age-related, developmental patterns and differences across time in general community influences rather than in school-specific effects on change. For prosocial education in general, these findings raise various questions about effective delivery and about the potential role of development. It is argued that these questions, by virtue of their significance in public policy decisions, need further investigation.

Professional development (PD) within the College is Section-specific. The Victorian Section organised a program of four workshops in 1999. The four topics shared a common emphasis on the work of educational and developmental psychologists as intervention agents. They comprised intervention management, conflict resolution, behavioural coaching, and conduct disorders.