Child Development

Child Development,the first volume in the Macmillan

Psychology Reference Series, is an extensive collec-

tion of articles about every facet of child develop-

ment, ranging from adoption and day care to welfare

programs and video games. It focuses on topics that

are important for the educated parent, pediatrician,

teacher, high school and college student, or anyone

else interested in better understanding the how’s and

why’s of a child’s development.

The 289 articles are organized in a way that will

make the Encyclopedia easily understood and accessi-

ble. To do this, we organized the collection by creat-

ing four separate types of entries:

• Overviews are articles consisting of 3,000 words
  that provide an in-depth look at a particular topic
  in child development such as parenting, social
  development, or child abuse. These articles intro-
  duce the reader to all of the important ideas and
  concepts within the topic and provide an intro-
  duction to some of the issues and controversies
  important to child development specialists.


• The second type of article is about 1,500 words
  long and serves as an introduction to important
  topics in child development. These are a bit less
  ambitious than the overviews, including brief dis-
  cussions about day care, home schooling, and
  friendship.


• Definitions are the third article type. These are
  150-word definitions of important terms that
  should be familiar to anyone interested in child
  development. Altruism, conservation, and bilin-
  gual education are examples of such articles. We
  created definitions of these terms rather than
  writing 1,500- or 3,000-word articles because we
  did not feel it necessary to elaborate on these top-
  ics to the same extent.
  
  
  • Biographies are comprised of 400 words and
    focus on leading characters in the history of child
    development. These are the men and women who
    are best known for the lasting and influential
    effects of their research and writing.
  
  
  
  

Finally, the appendix is replete with visually inter-

esting and easily understood tables and charts that

include topics such as children in various living

arrangements, child poverty, and youth participating

in volunteer activities.

Each entry is followed by a bibliography.

Who Will Use This Encyclopedia?

This Encyclopedia is for anyone who wants to

know more about the field of child development. This

includes parents, teachers, professionals in the health

fields, such as doctors and nurses, social workers,

lawyers, people involved in creating policies that

affect children and families, school board members,

and high school and college students who are inter-

ested in learning more about children or are writing

a term paper on an aspect of child development.

The editors emphasized the importance of writ-

ing for an educated audience that might not yet be

familiar with many of the terms and ideas relevant to

understanding a child’s development. We tried to

make this material informative and approachable, but

not overly technical. We hope that we have achieved

our goal.

How to Use This Encyclopedia

The topics are organized alphabetically from A to

Z. In addition, there are several other ways to locate

information.

First, there is an extensive subject index covering

every topic mentioned in the Encyclopedia along with

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PREFACE

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