The paper reports findings from a research study that explored children's experience of divorce. It shows that children experience parental divorce as a crisis in their lives but that they are able to mobilise internal and external resources to regain a new point of balance. In doing so, children demonstrate the degree to which they are active and competent participants in the process of family dissolution. The implications of the data are then considered in relation to engaging with children involved in divorce and in relation to some of the cultural presumptions that might militate against hearing what they have to say about their experiences.

Faces represent a “special” class of physically similar stimuli but it remains uncertain whether they are processed by cognitive systems that are functionally separate from those used for objects. This paper reports two experiments, which examine whether there exist qualitative differences in the semantic and associative priming of faces, “structurally similar” objects (living things), and “structurally distinct” objects (artefacts). Recognition was examined in Experiment 1 using the familiarity judgement task for faces and the object decision task for objects, and naming was examined in Experiment 2. Both experiments compared, within subjects, priming by associates (e.g. Eric Morecambe → Ernie Wise, lion → tiger and lock key) and priming by non-associates from the same semantic category (e.g. Keith Richards → Paul McCartney, bee → spider and nail-file → comb) against both “neutral” and unrelated prime conditions. Both experiments produced a remarkably similar pattern of results. For faces, there was a substantial priming effect from associates but no reliable priming from non-associates of the same semantic category. In contrast, both structurally similar and distinct objects were primed reliably by both associates and semantically (i.e. categorically) related non-associates. The results are interpreted within a model that proposes that the semantic representations of objects are inter-connected by abstracted superordinate categories, but that the representations of people (the elements of which, we propose, are specific biographical descriptive information units) are inter-connected by networks of inter-personal relatedness rather than by “categories” of celebrity.

There is a substantial body of quantitative evidence that documents the incidence of legal problem clusters, the tendency of problems to occur together. It has also been shown that some people are at greater risk of multiple problem experience than others, in particular, disadvantaged groups. Various policy initiatives, most recently in England and Wales, have been implemented to address the links between civil legal problems. However, to date there has been little empirical research on how clients present with clusters and the success of legal advisors in detecting multiple problems, including the barriers and facilitators that might be relevant. This article presents findings from an extensive empirical study on Community Legal Advice Centres, which were introduced in England and Wales to deliver integrated advice provision. The data are drawn from a triangulated qualitative study comprising advice session observations, and first and follow‐up interviews with clients and advisors. The data confirm the existence of problem clusters, but provide a new dimension to research on problem clusters by demonstrating in detail how and why multiple problems are difficult to detect. This systematic insight offers important lessons for policy and service developments that target vulnerable groups with multiple problems.

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This article considers the working of the current procedure intended to ensure the welfare of children when their parents divorce but are not seeking any orders relating to them. It shows that the process is ineffective in safeguarding children's welfare and is not geared to ensuring that their wishes and feelings are taken into account. It argues that the focus of policy should shift away from assuming that the legal system can handle the problems of divorce, towards using the legal process as a point of contact through which families can be offered the full range of services they may need during relationship breakdown.

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C on tem p or ary m od els of face recogn ition exp lain everyd ay d if® culties in n am e retrieval by pro p osin g th at n am e infor m ation can on ly be acce sse d after sem an tic infor m ation (e.g. B ru ce & You ng , 1986) or by p ro p osin g an arch itecture w h ich p uts n am e retrieval at a disadv an tage (e.g. Bu r to n & B ru ce, 1992). E xp erim ents rep or ted h ere exam ined the tim e requ ired to access na m e an d sem an tic de tails by ad u lt an d ch ild su bjects. In E xp erim en t 1 ad ult su bjects took m or e tim e to m atch fam iliar faces to n am es th an to oth er sem an tic d etails (e.g. oc cup ation ), a ® n d ing co n sisten t w ith all the p reviou s liter atu re on n am e retrieval. E xp erim en t 2, h owever, sh ow ed th at th e youn gest su bjects w ere sign i® can tly faster in m atch ing fam iliar faces to na m es th an to sem antic d etails. E xp erim en t 3 also sh ow ed that children w ere faster at accessin g n am es th an occu p atio ns w h en giving vocal resp on ses to p resentatio n s of fam iliar faces. T h ese ® nd ings are n ot p red icted by rigidly sequ en tial m od els of face recogn ition an d are d iscu sse d w ith sp eci® c reference to th e o nto gen esis of m ode ls based on a m or e¯exible con nection ist arch itectu re.T he frustration of recognizing a person' s face bu t being unable to rem em ber their nam e is a com m o n exp erience w ith w hich we can all identify. In the ad ult face recog nition literature th is problem has been highlighted by investigations of the storage an d retrieval of people' s nam es an d other biog rap hical details such as their occupation . Young, H ay an d E llis (1985), in a d iary study, showed that subjects w ere reporting frequent experiences of know ing a person' s occupation w ithout being able to rem em ber their nam e. In laboratory stu dies of tip-of-the-ton gu e (T O T ) states, H an ley an d C ow ell (1988) dem o nstrated that su bjects could judge a face as fam iliar an d retrieve that person's occupation but still be unable to rem em ber th e p erson' s nam e. Johnston and Bruce (1990) also show ed a speed advan tage for accessing bio grap hical details over nam es. O ther evidence com es from lear ning experim ents that have show n that nam es are m ore dif® cult to lear n th an is other biogr ap hical infor m ation (C oh en & Fau lkner, 1986), an d this is true even for labels that can be u sed either as a nam e or an occupatio n, such as C arpenter or Baker (M cWeeny,Requ ests for rep rints shou ld be sent to L.C. Scan lan, Sch ool of P ysch ology, Un iversity of Wales, Colle ge of Cardiff, PO Box 901, C ardiff, CF 1 3YG, U.K . Em ail: saplcs@ cardiff.ac.u k This rese arch was sup ported by a departm ental stu dentship from the sch ool of psyc hology at the U niversit y of Wales, Cardiff. We wou ld like to than k A ndy Youn g, M ike Burton, and S erge Bre  dart for help ful com me nts on an earlier version of the m anu scrip t.