Books in the Strungmann Forum Reports series

How eliminating "risk illiteracy" among doctors and patients will lead to better health care decision making.

Experts from a range of disciplines explore how humans and artificial agents can quickly learn completely new tasks through natural interactions with each other.

Experts explore the influence of trace metals on the pathogenesis of infectious diseases.

Experts discuss the potential of early intervention to transform outcomes for people with mental disorders.Mental illness represents one of the largest disease burdens worldwide, yet treatments have been largely ineffective in improving the quality of life for millions of affected individuals—in part because approaches taken have focused on late-stage disorders in adulthood. This volume shifts the focus by placing the developmental stage of "youth” at the center of mental health. The contributors challenge current nosology, explore mechanisms that underlie the emergence of mental disorders, and propose a framework to guide early intervention. Offering recommendations for the future, the book holds that early intervention in youth has the potential to transform outcomes for people with mental disorders and to reconfigure the landscape of mental health.The contributors discuss epidemiology, classification, and diagnostic issues, including the benefits of clinical staging; the context for emerging mental disorders, including both biological and sociocultural processes; biological mechanisms underlying risk for psychopathology, including aspects of neural circuitry; and developing and implementing prevention and early intervention, including assessment and intervention modalities and knowledge translation in early treatment of schizophrenia. ContributorsNicholas B. Allen, Mario Alvarez-Jimenez, G. Paul Amminger, Shelli Avenevoli, Hannah F. Behrendt, Tolulope Bella-Awusah, Maximus Berger, Byron K. Y. Bitanihirwe, Drew Blasco, John D. Cahill, Joanne S. Carpenter, Andrew M. Chanen, Eric Y. H. Chen, Shane D. Colombo, Christoph U. Correll, Christopher G. Davey, Kim Q. Do, Damien A. Fair, Helen L. Fisher, Sophia Frangou, John Gleeson, Robert K. Heinssen, Ian B. Hickie, Frank Iorfino,Matcheri S. Keshavan, Kerstin Konrad, Phuong Thao D. Le, Francis Lee, Leslie D. Leve, Sarah A. Lieff, Cindy H. Liu, Beatriz Luna, Patrick D. McGorry, Urvakhsh Meherwan Mehta, Andreas Meyer-Lindenberg, Shreya V. Nallur, Cristopher Niell, Merete Nordentoft, Dost Öngür, George C. Patton, Tomás Paus, Ulrich Reininghaus, Bernalyn Ruiz, Fred Sabb, Akira Sawa, Michael Schoenbaum, Gunter Schumann, Elizabeth M. Scott, Jai Shah, Vinod H. Srihari, Ezra Susser, John Torous, Peter J. Uhlhaas, Swapna K. Verma, T. Wilson Woo, Stephen J. Wood, Lawrence H. Yang, Alison R. Yung

Multidisciplinary perspectives on the cultural and evolutionary foundations of children's attachment relationships and on the consequences for education, counseling, and policy.It is generally acknowledged that attachment relationships are important for infants and young children, but there is little clarity on what exactly constitutes such a relationship. Does it occur between two individuals (infant-mother or infant-father) or in an extended network? In the West, monotropic attachment appears to function as a secure foundation for infants, but is this true in other cultures? This volume offers perspectives from a range of disciplines on these questions. Contributors from psychology, biology, anthropology, evolution, social policy, neuroscience, information systems, and practice describe the latest research on the cultural and evolutionary foundations on children's attachment relationships as well as the implications for education, counseling, and policy.The contributors discuss such issues as the possible functions of attachment, including trust and biopsychological regulation; the evolutionary foundations, if any, of attachment; ways to model attachment using the tools of information science; the neural foundations of attachment; and the influence of cultural attitudes on attachment. Taking an integrative approach, the book embraces the wide cultural variations in attachment relationships in humans and their diversity across nonhuman primates. It proposes research methods for the culturally sensitive study of attachment networks that will lead to culturally sensitive assessments, practices, and social policies.ContributorsKim Bard, Marjorie Beeghly, Allyson J. Bennett, Yvonne Bohr, David L. Butler, Nandita Chaudhary, Stephen H. Chen, James B. Chisholm, Lynn A. Fairbanks, Ruth Feldman, Barbara L. Finlay, Suzanne Gaskins, Valeria Gazzola, Ariane Gernhardt, Jay Giedd, Alma Gottlieb, Kristen Hawkes, William D. Hopkins, Johannes Johow, Elfriede Kalcher-Sommersguter, Heidi Keller, Michael Lamb, Katja Liebal, Cindy H. Liu, Gilda A. Morelli, Marjorie Murray, Masako Myowa-Yamakoshi, Naomi Quinn, Mariano Rosabal-Coto, Dirk Scheele, Gabriel Scheidecker, Margaret A. Sheridan, Volker Sommer, Stephen J. Suomi, Akira Takada, Douglas M. Teti, Bernard Thierry, Ross A. Thompson, Akemi Tomoda, Nim Tottenham, Ed Tronick, Marga Vicedo, Leslie Wang, Thomas S. Weisner, Relindis D. Yovsi

Experts review the latest research on the neocortex and consider potential directions for future research.