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This chapter argues that education was a key arena for spreading the influence of psychology. This is not a novel view, but it is argued that too much emphasis has been placed on the role of psychology in mental testing and child guidance as a tool of regulation, and too little on its significance for a more progressive pedagogy. It is argued that the latter reached well beyond the pioneering activities of figures like Montessori, the Russells, and A. S. Neill, and highlights the excitement about psychology among teachers exposed to the new ideas through teacher training. The role of psychological advice in childcare is considered, downplaying the influence of behaviourism and highlighting the ambivalence of psychologists towards popularization.

This chapter shows how child guidance became a highly technical medical specialty during the 1930s. Originally conceived as “common-sense psychiatry,” the evolution of child guidance into a uniquely American child psychiatry began in 1927, when the Commonwealth Fund abandoned its bold effort to prevent juvenile delinquency and adult neurosis and psychosis. Its new goal was to transform child guidance clinics into psychotherapeutic centers for the treatment of limited numbers of children, and child guidance into a medical specialty. It was not until 1959, however, that the American Psychiatric Association formally designated child psychiatry a subspecialty of psychiatry. To accomplish its new goals the Commonwealth Fund changed its own program and encouraged the clinics to change theirs. Instead of limiting its function to the diagnosis of children's problems and relying on community social agencies to use environmental manipulation to help troubled children, it urged the clinics to provide direct psychotherapy by a child guidance team.

This chapter examines the status of child welfare from 1918 to 1945, which was known to be a period of economic and political crises. Similar to Chapter 2, this chapter provides a brief background of child welfare, where most of the sources were the annual reports of the School Medical Service and the Ministry of Health. The health of school children during this time is scrutinized, and the Child Guidance Movement is introduced. One section focuses on the changing perspectives on juvenile delinquency, where the 1933 Children and Young Persons Act is introduced. The chapter ends with a section on child welfare during the war.

C. Lucia M. Valladares de Oliveira’s chapter focuses on psychoanalytic practices in Brazil under the dictatorship of Vargas between 1930 and 1945. The author identifies three key areas in which psychoanalysis gained prominence after 1930: public health (in the form of the children's clinic), analytic training [inspired by the model of the International Psychoanalytical Association (IPA)], and the human sciences (in university academic teaching). The interaction between these practices and institutions and the political life of the country is examined in detail. Valladares de Oliveira argues that the authoritarian thinking that dominated the Vargas dictatorship did not prevent the flourishing of psychoanalysis. In fact, psychoanalysis was readily accommodated by intellectuals from the left and right, as well as by the government, as it was seen as being able to contribute to nation building.

This chapter describes how the Hull House residents and Chicago clubwomen led the campaign to establish the first juvenile court in the nation in 1899. Ten years later they arranged for an investigation into the causes of juvenile delinquency by neurologist William Healy, who conducted a five-year clinical study of 823 children and youth referred to the Chicago court. Healy's research, supported by Chicago philanthropist Ethel Dummer, was published as The Individual Delinquent. As David Rothman has commented, it is hard to imagine a title more expressive of progressive thinking. A classic in its own time, The Individual Delinquent helped launch the child guidance movement of the 1920s, which led ultimately to the emergence of a unique American child psychiatry.

The chapter, together with the next chapter, argues that the period saw the re-imagining of age relations between adults and children away from a disciplinary approach towards one characterized by liberal principles based on a 'scientific' understanding of the child's emotional interiority; the parenting goal was to 'help and understand' children. The chapter examines several of the influences involved in the process such as cultural responses to the widely perceived post 1918 'crisis' in Western civilization, as well as the impact of Freudian psychoanalytic thought and practice. It also considers the 'new psychology', the rejection of behaviourism, notably by Susan Isaacs, the child guidance movement and the emergence of 'new era' progressive education. These developments, it is claimed, were important origins in what came to be known as social democracy's post 1940s family ideal.

This chapter traces the emergence of residential treatment centers in the 1930s and 1940s, which occurred in the context of several related developments in child welfare and psychiatry. Growing attention to child mental health and welfare, coupled with increasing public and private funds to care for dependent and mildly “troublesome” youth in the community, left many existing institutions for children somewhat aimless. At the same time, these processes also led to recognition of a new population of children whose needs were not met at home, in school, in juvenile courts, or even in child guidance clinics. These children, grouped under the label “emotionally disturbed,” were often defined by their rejection in every other arena of care. Guided in part by the work of psychoanalysts who had established therapeutic environments for troubled children, many administrators reimagined institutions as therapeutic, short-term centers for these “disturbed” children. Meanwhile, local circumstances interacted in ways that gradually transformed orphanages, schools for feebleminded children, and training schools into RTCs. Though these processes often occurred by happenstance, staff members developed institutional origin stories that characterized their centers as progressive institutions, providing care for children otherwise doomed to life in a custodial training school or state mental hospital.

“The Therapeutic Camp: Trends in Camps for Children with Social–Emotional Challenges” traces the history of mental health interventions and research in the summer camp setting. With the growing influence of the mental hygiene and child guidance movements, therapeutic camps were initiated by case work and group work agencies, family service agencies, hospitals, universities, and other organizations. Notable early therapeutic camp programs included the Boys’ Guidance Project (Michigan), Camp Ramapo (New York), and Camp Wawokiye (Ohio). The psychodynamic influence permeated Camp Wediko (Massachusetts) and Camp Chief Noonday (Michigan), led by Fritz Redl. In many of these camps, the continuity between the year-round work of the therapeutic agency and the camp program was stressed. Such camps employed case workers, group workers, and social work students. This chapter also discusses inclusion-model camps, adventure therapy, and family camps. The chapter concludes with reflections on Camp Towhee, a therapeutic camp in Ontario, Canada.

This chapter examines key innovations that began to project Saint Elizabeths’ psychiatric authority into the community—specifically, the outpatient clinic, psychiatric social work, and child guidance centers. Broadly defined as mental hygiene, these efforts were aimed at reducing the number of institutionalized patients and providing them follow-up care. They were also aimed at preserving the mental health of individuals and consequently preventing their institutionalization in the first place. The chapter is in part concerned with how black patients and their family members shaped the outpatient experience. It also addresses the role of Washington’s segregationist culture and politics in limiting these larger mental hygiene reforms among the District’s African American community.