Family Psychology

Caring for young children is one of the most challenging tasks an adult will ever face. No matter how much you love your child, there will be moments filled with frustration, anger, and even desperation. There will also be questions: Why does my four-year-old deliberately lie to me? Why is everything a struggle with my three-year-old? Should I ever spank my preschooler when she is disobedient? Over the years, millions of parents have come to trust the Positive Discipline series and its common-sense approach to child-rearing.

Increasing numbers of parents grapple with children who are acting out without obvious reason. Revved up and irritable, many of these children are diagnosed with ADHD, bipolar illness, autism, or other disorders, but don't respond well to treatment. They are then medicated, often with poor results and unwanted side effects. Based on emerging scientific research and extensive clinical experience, integrative child psychiatrist Dr. Victoria Dunckley has pioneered a four-week program to treat the frequent underlying cause, Electronic Screen Syndrome (ESS).

Today's parents are constantly pressured to be perfect. But in striving to do everything right, we risk missing what children really need for lifelong emotional security. Now the simple, powerful "Circle of Security" parenting strategies that Kent Hoffman, Glen Cooper, and Bert Powell have taught thousands of families are available in self-help form for the first time. Filled with vivid stories and unique practical tools, this book puts the keys to healthy attachment within everyone's reach - self-understanding, flexibility, and the willingness to make and learn from mistakes.

In this pioneering, practical book, Daniel J. Siegel, neuropsychiatrist and author of the bestselling Mindsight, and parenting expert Tina Payne Bryson offer a revolutionary approach to child rearing with twelve key strategies that foster healthy brain development, leading to calmer, happier children. The authors explain—and make accessible—the new science of how a child’s brain is wired and how it matures.

Dr. Neufeld and Dr. Maté explore the phenomenon of peer orientation: the troubling tendency of children and youth to look to their peers for direction—for a sense of right and wrong, for values, identity and codes of behavior. But peer orientation undermines family cohesion, poisons the school atmosphere, and fosters an aggressively hostile and sexualized youth culture. It provides a powerful explanation for schoolyard bullying and youth violence; it is an escalating trend that has never been adequately described or contested until Hold On to Your Kids.

If life with your teen has become a battleground, it's time to take action. This empathic book shows how. Trusted psychologists who have worked with thousands of families give you the tools you need to overcome defiance and get teen behavior back on track. Vivid stories and answers to frequently asked questions help you put the techniques into action. The updated second edition incorporates new scientific research on why some teens have more problems with self-control than others.

Through five editions, The 36-Hour Day has been an essential resource for families who love and care for people with Alzheimer disease. Whether a person has Alzheimer disease or another form of dementia, he or she will face a host of problems. The 36-Hour Day will help family members and caregivers address these challenges and simultaneously cope with their own emotions and needs. Featuring useful takeaway messages and informed by recent research into the causes of and the search for therapies to prevent or cure dementia, this edition includes new information.

If you have a daughter, it would be surprising if she doesn't struggle with anxiety and worry - either in short episodes or for longer periods. For a variety of reasons, childhood anxiety rates are soaring, especially among girls. Today's parents need to know what contributes to anxiety and worry and how they can empower their daughters to overcome troubling emotions. With your help, she will find the anchoring truth of God's strong, safe love for her and the confidence she needs to thrive.

Over decades of research and work with thousands of families, Russell A. Barkley has become a leading authority on attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in kids and teens. He has learned what a huge difference parents can make in supporting their children's success - as well as how overwhelming it can be. This concise guide presents 12 key parenting principles for dealing with common behavioral, emotional, and school challenges.

With more than three decades of experience as a licensed marriage and family therapist, Dr. McBride guides you through the emotional fallout and challenges of being married to and divorcing a narcissist. The court system assumes that both parties in most high-conflict divorces are at fault, but a narcissist can wreak havoc in the divorce process. Dr. McBride shows how to navigate this kind of divorce and how you and your children can heal afterward.

For Your Own Good, the contemporary classic exploring the serious if not gravely dangerous consequences parental cruelty can bring to bear on children everywhere, is one of the central works by Alice Miller, the celebrated Swiss psychoanalyst. With her typically lucid, strong, and poetic language, Miller investigates the personal stories and case histories of various self-destructive and/or violent individuals to expand on her theories about the long-term effects of abusive child-rearing.

For highly sensitive people, parenting offers unique stresses - but the good news is that sensitivity can also be a parent’s most valuable asset, leading to increased personal joy and a closer, happier relationship with their child. Dr. Elaine Aron, world-renowned author of the classic The Highly Sensitive Person and other best-selling books on the trait of high sensitivity, has written an indispensable guide for these parents. Drawing on extensive research and her own experience, she helps highly sensitive parents identify and address the implications of their heightened sensitivity.

Research has shown that the first three years in a child's life are a critical moment in their development, and that behavior patterns instilled during that time can have profound implications for the rest of a child's life. Hundreds of thousands of parents have already used the advice in Positive Discipline: The First Three Years to help set effective boundaries, forge strong foundations for healthy communication, and lay the groundwork for happy and respectful relationships with their young children.

Discover a way to end constant power struggles with your defiant, oppositional, "impossible" five-to-12-year-old, with the help of leading child psychologist Russell A. Barkley. Dr. Barkley's approach is research based, practical, and doable - and leads to lasting behavior change. Vivid, realistic stories illustrate what the techniques look like in action. Thoroughly revised to include the latest resources and 15 years' worth of research advances, the second edition also reflects Dr. Barkley's ongoing experiences with parents and kids.

Parents are the first to know when their child starts behaving differently. Has your son stopped eating his favorite food, or does he refuse to eat out with friends? Has your daughter drastically increased her exercise regimen or become obsessed with health foods? These are among the telltale signs that your child, like millions of others, may have an eating disorder (ED). In this essential guide, registered dietitians Casey Crosbie and Wendy Sterling introduce an all-new strategy you can use to help your child at home.

Visiting her family's South Carolina estate, socialite Gray Godfrey wakes from a night out to an empty bed. Her husband, Paul, is gone, and a thrashing hangover has wiped her memory clean. At first, she's relieved for the break from her tumultuous marriage; perhaps Paul just needed some space. But when his car is found abandoned on the highway, Gray must face the truth: Paul is gone. And Gray may not want him found. Her life is unraveling. When a stranger named Annie calls claiming to know Paul's whereabouts, Gray reluctantly accepts her help.

In this compelling book, the authors present an innovative therapeutic model for understanding and treating adults from emotionally abusive or neglectful families - families the authors call narcissistic. Narcissistic families have a parental system that is, for whatever reason (job stress, alcoholism, drug abuse, mental illness, physical disability, lack of parenting skills, self-centered immaturity), primarily involved in getting its own needs met.

When someone has obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), it can affect the entire family. This book is an essential guide to help family members cope with their loved one's compulsive behaviors, obsessions, and constant need for reassurance.

Respected Waldorf educator Rahima Baldwin Dancy explains the different stages of learning that children go through from birth to age six, giving you the wisdom and understanding to enrich your child's natural development in the right way at the right time. A trusted classic for over 20 years, this newly revised edition contains updated resources and additional information on discipline, early childhood programs, toilet training, using home life as curriculum, and more. From language and cognitive development to appropriate toys, Dancy speaks up for a rational approach to child-rearing.

Overcoming Borderline Personality Disorder is a compassionate and informative guide to understanding this profoundly unsettling - and widely misunderstood - mental illness, believed to affect approximately six percent of the general population. Rather than viewing people with BPD as manipulative opponents in a bitter struggle, or pitying them as emotional invalids, Valerie Porr cites cutting-edge science to show that BPD is a true neurobiological disorder and not, as many come to believe, a character flaw or the result of bad parenting.