We provide a narrative review of the extensive evidence that supports the efficacy and effectiveness of psychological treatments, across the life span, for common mental health disorders. To this end, relying primarily on meta-analytic studies, we examine the effects of psychological treatments for depression, bipolar disorder, generalised anxiety disorder, social anxiety disorder, specific phobia, panic disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and posttraumatic stress disorder. Based upon data from hundreds of studies and thousands of participants, there is substantial evidence for both the efficacy and effectiveness of specific forms of psychological intervention for these disorders. Moreover, for most disorders, the clinical impact of specific forms of psychological treatment has been found to be at least equal to that of medication. Accordingly, the research evidence strongly supports the use of a number of specific psychological treatments, most of which are cognitive-behavioural treatments, as first-line interventions for these commonly occurring mental disorders among youth, adults, and older adults.

No abstract

Increasingly, child maltreatment research has begun to address ethnicity and culture in both empirical studies and theoretical articles. Despite the expansion of these efforts, cross-cultural research in child maltreatment has raised more questions than it has answered; and it has highlighted the elusiveness of culture-specific constructs to scientific study. Research to date has been hampered by several challenges including the failure to disentangle ethnicity and culture. In this article, we provide a review of research in this area and offer a critique and recommendations for enhancing the study of the role of culture and ethnicity in child maltreatment.

Little is known about the way children with learning disabilities (LD) develop an understanding of their disability. In this study, 95 students (23 elementary and 72 junior high) were interviewed to determine how they were informed about their learning disability and what they knew about it. Students were also administered two questionnaires, Harter's What I Am Like and Heyman's Self-Perception of a Learning Disability (SPLD). All students reported being told about their learning problems either by their parents, school personnel, or "no one." Contrary to our hypothesis, increased knowledge about LD was not associated with higher self-esteem. Understanding of one's LD was associated with actual and perceived scholastic competence, while global self-esteem was associated with perceptions of competence in nonacademic domains. Concerns about current measures of self-understanding and future directions for helping children with LD understand their disability and maintain their self-esteem are discussed.