Youth Justice and Child Welfare: Needs and Service Access Related to Trauma, Risk and Behavioral Patterns

Dear Colleagues,

We live in difficult times, with youth encountering challenges not witnessed in recent decades: political instability, economic, social, public and personal health (e.g., trauma, educational and social justice) issues. Such experiences and challenges are elevated among youth aged 11 to 25 involved in the child welfare and justice systems. There is a pressing need to understand and address these issues, so the next generation of citizens and leaders can be equipped to successfully respond to the challenges they will inevitably face. These are the challenges and solutions we seek to explore in a Special Issue of Adolescents.

We aim to publish ten original peer review manuscripts on the array of pressing issues experienced by justice-involved and child welfare youth, as well as creative responses to these issues. For example, topics may include (but are not limited to) the following:

• Social, demographic, political, and economic changes and their impact on child welfare and justice-involved youth in North America/South America/
• Advances in technology and improvements in identifying and treating public health problems among child welfare and justice-involved youth.
• Integrating child welfare and juvenile justice services for marginalized, immigrant, and indigenous youth.
• Patterns and consequences of health risk (substance use, sexually transmitted diseases, and mental health issues) among public welfare and justice-involved youth.

If you would like to be considered, please email us the name/email of a corresponding author, a 150-300 word abstract, and where you are based with any preliminary analysis/abstract by 30 June 2026. By 30 July 2026, we will select 10-12 authors to invite to submit manuscripts, prioritizing those that fit the issue and can be submitted by 31 December 2026. Time and space permitting, we will consider later submissions or timelines—but our goal is to have all in the peer review process no later than 30 June 2027 for publication next year. 

Prof. Dr. Richard Dembo
Dr. Michael L. Dennis
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Adolescents is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1200 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• youth
• emerging adult
• teens
• substance use disorders
• mental health
• welfare
• juvenile justice
• foster care
• trauma
• victimization
• risk behaviors
• recidivism
• development
• sexual risk behaviors
• detention
• drug court
• community supervision