 | Thisbiography of a living personneeds additionalcitations forverification. Please help by addingreliable sources.Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced orpoorly sourcedmust be removed immediately from the article and its talk page, especially if potentiallylibelous. Find sources: "James Garbarino" – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(May 2011) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
James Garbarino is an author and professor atLoyola University Chicago. He has specialized in studying what causes violence in children, how they cope with it and how to rehabilitate them. Garbarino has served as consultant or adviser to a wide range of organizations, including the National Committee to Prevent Child Abuse, the National Institute for Mental Health, theAmerican Medical Association, the National Black Child Development Institute, theNational Science Foundation, the U.S. Advisory Board on Child Abuse and Neglect, and theFBI. In addition, Garbarino's work is associated with the School of Human Ecology at Cornell University under the leadership ofUrie Bronfenbrenner who beganHead Start programs in the US.
Garbarino has written on the causes of violent behavior in children and how they cope withstress. He has studied the impact of war on children, including children inKuwait,Iraq,Bosnia, andCroatia. He has also conducted many interviews with children who have been convicted of violent crimes in the United States, concluding thatabuse and neglect at an early age are contributing causes to the violent behavior of these children. He has served as anexpert witness involving issues of trauma, violence, and abuse in both civil and criminal trials. Garbarino and his coauthors have also conducted many interviews with other high school students and teachers aboutbullying and social problems at school to help understand ways to improve the school environment.
Garbarino recommends that violence prevention begin at an early age by recognizing underlying causes and addressing them before they expand. He advocates programs that provide assistance to young at-risk children and parents, including a home visiting program that provides home visitors to young mothers at risk to help with child care and provide advice about child rearing. Children who have benefited from this program have reduced drop out and delinquency rates.[1] He has also advised intervention when there are problems in school at a young age with advice and counseling rather than punishment when possible. He believes this is often less expensive and more productive than waiting for problems to get worse.[2]
