Placing Children's Interests First: Developmentally Appropriate Parenting Plans 10 Virginia Journal of Social Policy & the Law 2002-2003

10 Va. J. Soc. Pol'y & L. 98 (2002-2003)
Placing Children's Interests First: Developmentally Appropriate Parenting Plans

handle is hein.journals/vajsplw10 and id is 108 raw text is: PLACING CHILDREN'S INTERESTS FIRST:

DEVELOPMENTALLY APPROPRIATE PARENTING PLANS
Michael E. Lamb*
INTRODUCTION
The legal system, broadly conceived, affects children's lives in a variety
of circumstances. For example, courts and public agencies intervene
when parents appear incapable of caring for their children appropriately,
when parents must place their children in the care of others because they
are incapacitated, employed, or incarcerated, when parents cannot agree
with one another regarding the custody and care of their children
following divorce, and when children have been victimized. Although
legal intervention in these cases may often be justified by reference to
children's best interests, the interventions themselves are seldom
informed by reference to developmental theory or the results of scientific
research. Instead, political ideology and cultural values tend to guide
decision-making and policy development. Furthermore, in the case of
divorce, what's fair for the parents often obscures or trumps the
children's best interests.
The failure of policy and decision makers to take advantage of a
burgeoning and increasingly sophisticated understanding of child
development is unfortunate and may threaten the quality of social policy.
Researchers actually know a significant amount about the ability of
young children to tolerate separations from parents and care providers
and to be influenced by variations in the quality of the care they
receive.1 They have also developed appreciation for the variability
* Head of the Section of Social and Emotional Development at the National Institute of
Child Health and Human Development, National Institutes of Health, Department of
Health and Human Services. Previously, he was Professor of Psychology, Pediatrics,
and Psychiatry at the University of Utah. His research focuses on social and emotional
development, especially in infancy and early childhood.
1 See generally Ross A. Thompson, Early Sociopersonality Development, in 3
Handbook of Child Psychology 25 (William Damon & Nancy Eisenberg eds., John

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