The second edition of this encyclopedia continues to break new ground as an important resource for the study of adolescence. Comprehensive in breath and textbook in depth, the second edition - with entries presented in easy-to-access A to Z format - serves as a reference repository of knowledge in the field as well as a frequently updated conduit of new research and knowledge long before such information trickles down to standard textbooks. This updated and expanded major reference work advances the field by pushing and creating new boundaries and areas of study that further our understanding of adolescents and their place in society. In addition to the original 730 entries, the new edition adds more than 200 new essays as well as updates to many other entries. Substantively, the second edition continues to draw from four major areas of research relating to adolescence:The first broad area includes research relating to "Self, Identity and Development in Adolescence"The second broad area centers on "Adolescents' Social and Personal Relationships".The third area examines "Adolescents in Social Institutions"."Adolescent Mental Health" constitutes the last major area of research.This unique, comprehensive second edition of the Encyclopedia of Adolescence is an essential reference for advanced undergraduate and graduate students as well as researchers, professors, clinicians, and other practitioners across such related disciplines as developmental psychology, criminology and criminal Justice, adolescent psychiatry, child and school psychology, family, and public health.

Roger J.R. Levesque, J.D. (Columbia Law School), Ph.D. (Psychology, the University of Chicago), is professor of criminal justice at Indiana University and Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Youth and Adolescence. Prior to his current faculty position, he was Professor of Psychology and Law at the University of Arizona. Professor Levesque's research focuses on the legal regulation of families and the nature of children/adolescents' rights. In addition to having published numerous journal articles, Levesque is the author of eight books (and the editor of one) dealing mainly with the nature family and the laws that shape our intimate lives. His most recent text, Adolescents, Media and the Law was published by Oxford University Press in 2007. One of his other texts dealing with intersections between human development and the law, Not by Faith Alone: Religion, Law and Adolescence (New York University Press), won the Society for the Study of Adolescence 2004 best authored book award. He also is the author of the first (and still only) law case book, Child Maltreatment Law (Carolina Academic Press), which presents legal materials and related social science information to help readers understand the breadth and depth of legal responses to child maltreatment.