Welcome to the ‘Forensics in Children and Adolescents’ themed edition of The Bridge, covering the intersection of science, clinical practice and the criminal justice system.
Society has long sought to understand through philosophy and science, what makes people commit crimes or engage in antisocial behaviours. This is a specialist area within child and adolescent mental health services with high variation in service provision despite initiatives at a national levels.
The area of forensics is often not well understood within non-forensic services, and the risks involved raise anxieties within clinicians and the multiagency setting as well as for parents and carers. Research is developing in this area, and our understanding of psychological traits and associated other difficulties, e.g. learning, neurodevelopmental disorders and addictions. It is also developing our understanding, through the evidence base, of the costs to individuals and society.
Within this issue, there are summaries based upon journal articles from ACAMH’s suite of journals- JCPP and CAMH as well as commissioned pieces on this topic matter giving food for thought.
I hope you find this edition helpful. This pdf has some of the articles from the Forensic issue of The Bridge, please feel free to share this and the direct links below with colleagues. Email publications@acamh.org with details of what you’d like to see in future.
Articles from this edition
Reconstructing child psychopathy
Functional Family Therapy does not reduce ASB or offending in youths
Children at risk of developing antisocial behaviours show deficits in affective empathy
Language impairment needs more recognition in the juvenile justice system
Police contact during adolescence can delay female psychosocial maturation
Low empathy in adolescent boys predicts violent behaviour in adulthood
