Table of Contents

Introduction - Nancy E. Dowd
Prologue: Developmental Variations Among Children and Adolescents: An Overview of the Research and Policy Implications - Dorothy G. Singer
Part I. Children as Victims
1. Child Witnessing of Domestic Violence - Naomi Cahn
2. Domestic Violence and Child Protection: Confronting the Dilemmas in Moving From Family Court to Dependency Court - Thomas D. Lyon and Mindy B. Mechanic
3. Sexually Predatory Parents and the Children in Their Care: Remove the Threat, Not the Child - Robin Fretwell Wilson
4. Exposure to Pornography as a Cause of Child Sexual Victimization - Diana E.H. Russell and Natalie Purcell
5. Statutory Rape: An Empirical Examination of Claims of “Overreaction” - Ross E. Cheit and Laura Braslow
6. Mitigating the Impact of Publicity on Child Crime Victims and Witnesses - Charles Putnam and David Finkelhor
Part II. Children as Consumers of Violence
7. The Violent Shadows of Children’s Culture - John Cech
8. A Preliminary Demography of Television Violence - Nancy Signorielli
9. Protecting Children’s Welfare in an Anxiety-Provoking Media Environment - Joanne Cantor
10. The Impact of Violent Music on Youth - Barbara J. Wilson and Nicole Martins
11. How Real Is the Problem of TV Violence? Research and Policy Perspectives - Dale Kunkel and Lara Zwarun
12. Violent Video Games: Effects on Youth and Public Policy Implications - Douglas A. Gentile and Craig A. Anderson
13. Positive Features of Video Games - Laurie N. Taylor
14. Children, Adolescents, and the Culture of Online Hate - Brendesha Tynes
15. Constitutional Obstacles to Regulating Violence in the Media - Catherine J. Ross
Part III. Children as Perpetrators of Violence
16. Peer Victimization: The Nature and Prevalence of Bullying Among Children and Youth - Susan P. Limber
17. Bullying and Violence in American Schools - Ellen de Lara
18. Judging Juvenile Responsibility: A Social Ecological Perspective - Mark R. Fondacaro and Lauren G. Fasig
19. Adult Punishment for Juvenile Offenders: Does It Reduce Crime? - Richard E. Redding
20. Psychopathy Assessment and Juvenile Justice Mental Health Evaluations - Matthew Owen Howard, Michael K. Dayton, Kirk A. Foster, Michael G. Vaughn and John L. Zelner
21. Cleaning Up Toxic Violence: An EcoGenerist Paradigm - Barbara Bennett Woodhouse

About the Author

Nancy E. Dowd is Chesterfield Smith Professor of Law at the Fredric G. Levin College of Law at the University of Florida, and Co-Director of the Center for Children and Families at UF.  The author of In Defense of Single Parent Families (1997) and Redefining Fatherhood (2001), and a reader on feminist legal theory, she has published extensively on non-traditional families, work/family issues, civil rights, and feminist theory.   Dorothy G. Singer, is retired Senior Research Scientist, Department of Psychology, Yale University. Dr. Singer is also Co-Director, with Jerome L. Singer, of the Yale University Family Television Research and Consultation Center affiliated with the Zigler Center for Child Development and Public Policy. She is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association. Her research and publications are in the area of early childhood development, television effects on youth, and parent training in imaginative play. She received the Distinguished Alumni Award from Teachers College, Columbia University in 2006, and in 2009, the Award for Distinguished Lifetime Contributions to Media Psychology from the American Psychological Association.



Robin Fretwell Wilson is Associate Professor of Law at the University of Maryland School of Law.  She has published articles on the risks of abuse to children in the Cornell Law Review, Emery Law Journal, Journal of Child and Family Studies, Washington University Journal of Law & Policy, and Child and Family Law Quarterly.  She has testified on the use of social science research in legal decision-making before the Federal Trade Commission and Department of Justice Joint Hearings on Health Care.  A member of the Executive Committee of the Family and Juvenile Law Section of the Association of American Law Schools, Professor Wilson has frequently lectured on violence against children, including presentations at the Family Law Project hosted by Harvard University Law School, the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children in London, the Tenth World conference of the International Society of Family Law in Brisbane, Australia, the Third International Conference on Child and Adolescent Mental Health in Brisbane, the 2004 Helping Families Change conference in Auckland, New Zealand, and the Ninth Regional European Conference of the International Society for the Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect in Warsaw, Poland.

Reviews

"Addresses childhood and adolescent violence from a fresh perspective:  the experiential world of the child and adolescent.  This is needed….The editors have succeeded in organizing an impressive, interdisciplinary group of contributors.  Balanced and thorough, the book should be very appealing to the intended audiences….It integrates a wide scope of material under the general topic, and by an excellent cadre of contributors."
*James Howell*

"By bringing together the literatures and crossing disciplinary lines, the book should have wide cross-disciplinary appeal….The key strength is the idea of an integrated approach to children and violence that includes children as consumers, victims, and perpetrators of violence….I think that any scholar working in the area of child and family violence would like a book like this one….It advances understanding of children and violence and is an excellent resource book for policy makers."
*Elizabeth D. Hutchison*

"…an excellent contribution to diverse fields (e.g., psychology, law, sociology)….The content is broad but appropriate in each of the three sections."
*Eric F. Dubow*

"A book with a unique perspective that will bring together research across several disciplines.  It′s helpful to have such a single source that provides an overview of the research on children and violence in several different contexts."
*Amy Nathanson*

"The Editors and Contributors to this volume are excellent.  I am especially familiar with Dr. Singer′s work, which is superb."
*Brad Bushman*

"The papers are well written and reflect timely information that is well documented from research, and also explore policy implications within each area."
*D. S. Pierson*

"Each chapter contains recommendations for legislators, policy makers, researchers, and families. This book should be on the desk, and minds, of legislators, attorneys, social workers and other mental health professionals who encounter and wish to ameliorate the effects of violence in the lives of their young constituents, clients, and patients."

—JOURNAL OF CHILD AND FAMILY STUDIES
*Pamela R. Melton*