Legal Reforms Affecting Child and Youth Services

by Gary Melton, Gary B. Melton

Legal and behavioral science scholars examine the significance of the recent changes in laws affecting child and youth services and the conflicts those changes have engendered. Providers of child and youth services now can have at their fingertips the most recent information on changes in the law related to consent to treatment by children, special education, child abuse policy, procedural reform in divorce custody resolution, and juvenile justice reform. Some of the timely issues addressed in this highly acclaimed volume include the fall of the rehabilitative ideal in the juvenile justice system, the increasing concern for juvenile's procedural rights, child custody disputes, and laws regulating educational and treatment services. Legal Reforms Affecting Child and Youth Services is an essential volume for providers of services in education, pediatrics, mental health, juvenile justice, and child welfare. The authors integrate legal analyses of key concepts with discussion of potential behavioral science contributions to formulation and implementation of legal reforms. In each instance, the implications of these reforms for service delivery systems are explored with attention to gaps in available research and ambiguities in the existing law.

150 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1983