Mental Health and Behavioral Intervention for Children at Risk

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue focuses on the mental health and behavioral patterns of high-risk children, aiming to explore their underlying psychological mechanisms, effective intervention strategies, and long-term development outcomes from a multi-dimensional psychological perspective. Children at risk, including those without effective guardianship, children with autism spectrum disorder, orphaned children, and other high-risk groups, face unique challenges in emotional regulation, social adaptation and cognitive development due to long-term exposure to adverse environments or neurodevelopmental differences. These challenges not only affect their current sense of happiness but also their long-term development trajectory. Therefore, it is crucial to explore targeted psychological intervention measures based on scientific theories.

This Special Issue will reveal the dynamic interaction between individual psychological processes and environmental factors in shaping the mental health of these children, as well as advance evidence-based behavioral intervention strategies. Its scope mainly includes three inter-related aspects. Firstly, by using developmental psychology, we study the cumulative impact of intervention sensitive periods and risk factors at specific ages on psychological resilience. From the perspective of cognitive psychology, we explore the positive psychology of children under difficult circumstances, investigating potential mechanisms such as impaired social information processing in abused children or executive function deficits in children with autism, aiming to interpret the behavioral manifestations of at-risk groups of children. We give priority to empirical research on psychological intervention, including cognitive behavioral therapy, play therapy, and parent-mediated intervention for children. The Special Issue will analyze how these intervention measures are consistent with the theoretical framework. We encourage research on standardized psychological assessment tools to identify mental health risks and conduct longitudinal studies to track the long-term impact of intervention measures on development outcomes.

The existing literature in this field often has two limitations: First, most studies focus on a single risk factor and do not systematically explore the interaction of multiple factors. Secondly, some studies focus more on describing practical technologies, and there is still room for improvement in exploring theoretical foundations. This Special Issue will respond to these topics through open academic dialogue and encourage researchers to integrate theory and practice from multiple perspectives. We welcome the integration of insights from developmental psychology to explore the unique psychological needs and development patterns of at-risk children at different age stages. We look forward to analyzing the deep-seated psychological mechanisms behind behaviors from the perspective of cognitive psychology. Potential authors are also encouraged to apply the biopsychosocial model of health psychology to explore the dynamic interaction between mental states and physical health. We look forward to building a bridge to enable the integration of theory and practice through such academic exploration, on the one hand, promoting the scientific and standardized development of psychological assessment tools and intervention programs and on the other hand, providing a diverse scientific basis for policymakers to design more targeted support systems, jointly enriching understanding of mental health and behavioral intervention for children at risk.

We invite empirical articles and systematic reviews to advance this interdisciplinary agenda. We welcome relevant scholars to provide a bridge between theory, practice, and policy in this key area; enhance our understanding of how psychological science can offer more precise, culturally appropriate, and sustainable intervention measures for children at risk; promote the development of global knowledge and localized solutions; and, ultimately, contribute to their healthy development.

Dr. Yean Wang
Prof. Dr. Guanghuai Zheng
Dr. Xinfeng Tang
Prof. Dr. Kuo Zhang
Prof. Dr. Xiaokang Lyu
Guest Editors

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• children at risk
• mental health
• depression
• health promotion services
• prevention
• behavioral intervention
• positive psychology of children in difficult circumstances
• cognitive behavioral mechanism
• psychological resilience
• longitudinal intervention study