In August 2014, the Australian Childhood Foundation ran a conference on childhood trauma using a unique format. We gathered together a range of the world's master knowledge-builders in the field of interpersonal neurobiology. We asked them to explore themes that were relevant to the ways in which those affected by trauma could heal through connection and care.

Welcome to the year of 2015. This year celebrates the 40th year of Children Australia's publication, quite an achievement when one thinks of the difficulties in establishing and maintaining a journal – and the many changes that have taken place over that time in the way of technical production and the processes of publication. This year we welcome a number of new international Editorial Consultants from the UK, Norway, Ireland and the USA, and, of course, welcome back our readers and supporters of the journal. I trust you had a safe and peaceful Christmas and New Year, though this is often such a brief interlude that it is easily forgotten amid the busyness of the return to work. For 2015, we plan to have a June Special Issue, and apologise to those of you who expected this current issue to contain the plenary addresses to the International Conference on Innovation in Therapeutic Approaches with Children, Young People and Families. We are hoping that trauma-related papers from the Conference, titled Childhood trauma – understanding the basis for change and recovery, will be published in June.

In his latest book, Touch - The Science of Hand, Heart and Mind, respected neuroscientist David Linden (2015) elegantly dives into the complexity of the circuitry that connects the body and the brain in integrative processes of experience. Detailing different types of fibres which conduct information from the sensors in our skin to the brain, he describes how the speed of information flow is critical to the way we can discern various forms of touch.

This special celebratory issue of Children Australia marks a milestone in the commitment, tenacity and vision of many people across the last 40 years. Academics and professional practitioners, alike, have contributed their expertise and wisdom in a variety of roles – from writing and editing to financial backing and administrative excellence. Without this range of knowledge, and the determination to keep the journal alive and responsive to our changing world, we would not be in the strong and vibrant position we find ourselves in 2015.

Many child welfare statutes protect children when caregivers jeopardise their safety and best interests, but what if the risk is sourced in government child welfare policy or practice? Instead of including provisions to hold governments accountable for placing children in harm's way, governments and their agents are largely protected against any systemic maltreatment claims made against them. This paper describes a precedent-setting case before the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal attempting to hold the Canadian federal government accountable for its systemic failure to ensure that First Nations children are protected from maltreatment linked to inequitable federal child welfare funding on reserves. The case is a rare example using an independent judicial mechanism with the authority to make binding orders against the government and enveloping the proceedings in a public education and engagement movement. Implications of the case for child rights in Canada and abroad are discussed.

We have great pleasure in introducing three of our new Editorial Consultants to readers in this Issue of the journal—Dr Neerja Sharma from New Delhi in India, and Drs Antoinette Lombard and Liana le Roux from South Africa.

Although childhood trauma and family adversity can increase vulnerability to serious mental health problems, uncertainty exists about the nature and prevalence in a clinical population. This embedded research aims to establish the prevalence of trauma and adversity in young people seeking help from Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS). All children, adolescents, and their parents/guardian attending their initial assessment at a CAMHS service were invited to participate in the ‘Stressful Life and Family Difficulties study’ and a clinical interview. 162 families participated in the study. It was more common for young people to experience multiple adversities (three or more) in the last 12 months than single events. Mothers self-reported a greater number of family adversities than fathers. According to clinicians, the most frequent adversities experienced by young people were having a parent with a mental illness (66%), being bullied (63%) and parental divorce or separation (43%). Overall, clinicians reported that 69% of CAMHS clients had experienced a potentially traumatic experience (any physical, emotional or sexual abuse, child neglect or traumatic event). Moreover, young people with trauma histories were significantly more likely to have a parent with a history of trauma.

Children Australia has had the support and advice of many academic and professional practitioners over its many years of publication, with a number of people serving as Editorial Consultants. More recently, a number of international academics have joined our ranks, following in the footsteps of Nicola Taylor, Director of the Children's Issues Centre at the University of Otago, in Auckland, New Zealand, who was the first of our overseas academics. Nicola was the Guest Editor of a Special Issue some time ago, heralding what is now a more regular feature of the journal – encouraging collections of papers addressing specific topics.

For 40 years, Children Australia (and previous incarnations) has provided an enormously valuable space for research, practice and policy to delineate challenges, successes and innovation on issues pertaining to the wellbeing and welfare of children and their families. Articles published in the Journal during this period have been incredibly influential and have added to our collective knowledge of children, young people and their families. Nowhere has this been more evident than the area of out-of-home care (OOHC). This paper will explore and reflect on some of the issues that have been articulated in papers published in the journal over the last 40 years – with a specific focus on Australian Kinship, Foster, Residential and Therapeutic Residential Care. Past issues that are still presenting current challenges will be described and opportunities for change and future improvement identified.

During the past two decades an explosion of interdisciplinary research, especially in developmental neuroscience, has transformed and deepened our understanding of how the seminal social emotional events of infancy indelibly impact, for better or worse, all later stages of human development. In this article I briefly summarise my contributions in regulation theory towards that effort. After describing a current paradigm shift in the developmental sciences, I present an overview of my ongoing studies on the interpersonal neurobiology of the mother–infant attachment relationship. I offer research which indicates that optimal attachment experiences facilitate the experience-dependent maturation of the early developing ‘emotional’ right brain and thereby a predisposition for emotional wellbeing in later stages of life. I conclude with thoughts about the application of regulation theory for early intervention and prevention programs, as well as some larger implications for family law, cultural and political systems, and human capital formation.

The importance of social networks for young people who have experienced abuse and neglect remains an underdeveloped area of research and practice. The aim of the study was to investigate the relationship between abuse experienced by children and adolescents and subsequent outcomes on their social support networks. The study sample consisted of 85 clients (aged 8–15) of a service specifically for children reported to child protection due to child abuse and neglect. Abuse was measured using the Harm Consequences Assessment (HCA), which recorded the level of abuse experienced in five domains: Abandonment/No Appropriate Carer, Developmental and Medical Harm, Emotional and Psychological Harm, Physical Harm and Injury, and Sexual Harm. This also ranked abuse experienced in terms of severity: concerning, serious or extreme. Social network was measured using the Social Network Map. Analyses revealed a very high level of abuse for most young people across multiple domains. Social support was most evident in the “other family” category, and a relatively high level of perceived support was reported. There were few significant associations between levels of abuse and social support networks. However, one significant effect evident was for those young people who had not experienced developmental abuse who reported a significantly better network quality in work/school area of life than those who had experienced concerning or serious developmental abuse. This study contributes to an important body of emerging evidence on social support networks for children who have experienced maltreatment.

Living in poverty has lifelong consequences for children. In response to the obvious needs of highly vulnerable, impoverished children and youth in its neighbourhood, Community and Family Services International (CFSI) commenced the Park Avenue Initiative (PAI) which was aimed at addressing the impact of poverty through promoting and testing community-based initiatives in child protection, youth development, and opportunity-creation. Building upon research into the reproductive health (RH) practices of young people in the area, the PAI was expanded to include a new programme addressing RH and the high risk sexual behaviours engaged in by many youth. This article critically examines how poverty is impacting on children. It presents the PAI RH approach as an example of a programme which addresses many of the multiple risks poverty presents for children. The PAI RH programme takes a holistic perspective to address the co-morbidity of poverty risk factors. The programme works with children, their families and the community. The article concludes that programmes need to take an integrated approach to address the multidimensions of poverty and engage with children and their families in actions which are aimed at building individual resilience and strengthening communities.

Post-traumatic stress affects both the mental and physical health of individuals, giving rise to various psychological disturbances. The neurological effects of these disturbances are similar across age groups, irrespective of race or culture. However, the perception of psychological disturbances differs from culture to culture depending on issues such as the stigma that attaches to mental illness and the ability or willingness to seek assistance. While much research has been undertaken on the impact of trauma on both adults and children, research to explore the effect of trauma on people in the context of their various cultures, especially people of refugee background, remains at an early stage. Mental health professionals working with refugees encounter various challenges. They range from dealing with resistance by individuals to the notion of counselling itself, to barriers such as the perceived stigma that prevents some individuals from acknowledging mental health problems. Other challenges in providing mental health services in such cases are contributed to by government policies and the limited resources available. All this exacerbates the mental health of traumatised parents and caregivers, and has a ripple effect on their children, who exhibit the effects of trauma in their own ways. This paper aims to highlight and discuss these issues through the presentation of two case studies, suggest a workable recovery model, possible ways to deal with the challenges, and to propose recommendations for working with non-Western children and their families.

The Polyvagal Theory helps us understand how cues of risk and safety, which are continuously monitored by our nervous system, influence our physiological and behavioral states. The theory emphasizes that humans are on a quest to calm neural defense systems by detecting features of safety. This quest is initiated at birth when the infant needs for being soothed are dependent on the caregiver. The quest continues throughout the lifespan with needs for trusting friendships and loving partnerships to effectively co-regulate each other. The Polyvagal Theory proposes that through the process of evolution, social connectedness evolved as the primary biological imperative for mammals in their quest for survival. Functionally, social connectedness enabled proximity and co-regulation of physiological state between conspecifics starting with the mother-infant relationship and extending through the lifespan with other significant partners. The theory explains why feeling safe requires a unique set of cues to the nervous system that are not equivalent to physical safety or the removal of threat. The theory emphasizes the importance of safety cues emanating through reciprocal social interactions that dampen defense and how these cues can be distorted or optimized by environmental and bodily cues.

This paper is a reflective commentary that highlights some of the issues that impacted upon my thinking and perspectives as a social worker working in the child, youth and family sector. The paper takes the form of a narrative with some accounts of incidents that were memorable and challenged the ways I thought about myself and issues we face in the sector. My concerns are that, while there are many aspects of the work done in this sector in the past that we don't want to repeat, there are also features of service delivery that we overlook in the contemporary tendency to want quick solutions and pursue trends. The conclusions I have come to include the need for community-based, co-located services for parents and children who need supports and out-of-home care responses (OOHC).

This opinion piece draws on the literature regarding absconding from care and its links with child sexual exploitation and trauma. The author draws on her experience in the child protection, out-of-home care and therapeutic services to raise some questions and suggest some themes about how the system responds when young people run away from what is purportedly safe to what is palpably unsafe. The article concludes with a brief description of trauma-informed practice and suggests that this concept is a useful contribution in our response to helping young people no longer needing to run.

When child protection caseworkers make first contact with the parents of a child (or children) who is suspected of being at ‘significant risk of harm’ they may encounter a range of hostile, angry and aggressive verbal responses from parents. If this contact results in a child being removed from parental care, it is not unknown for these responses to escalate into attempts at verbal intimidation and loud threats of personal violence. These behaviours then get recorded in case files and in materials submitted to the Children's Court to support the case for permanent removal of a child from parental care; these behaviours being presented as evidence of the parents’ unsuitability and unwillingness to comply with demands for changes in their child rearing practices. But how should child protection caseworkers view these less-than-helpful parental responses, and how should they, in turn, respond? This article explores this issue and offers a number of ways of understanding these behaviours, and canvasses new ways for caseworkers to respond when these behaviours occur.

The STARTTerS Early Childhood Programme at the NSW Service for the Treatment and Rehabilitation of Torture and Trauma Survivors (STARTTS) has been developed in response to the complex refugee experiences of very young children, their families and communities. This biopsychosocial and systemic model is informed by neuroscience, attachment theory and current knowledge of the nature and impact of refugee-specific trauma on very young children and their families. It addresses the complex interactions between, social, cultural and political factors within the trauma and recovery environments, as they influence the clients’ presentations and the choice of interventions with families in cultural transition (FICT).

This paper provides a background to the STARTTerS programme, and reports on the results of a Community Based Participatory Research (CBPR) project with the Karen and Mandaean refugee communities. It explores perceptions and cultural views of signs and symptoms related to early childhood trauma. It also explores help seeking preferences in relation to the recovery, settlement and health needs of families with young children. This research has led to ongoing collaborative and consultative processes with those communities, resulting in the development of services and referral systems, which will build a comprehensive and culturally appropriate early childhood programme.

Resilience is often associated with extreme trauma or overcoming extraordinary odds. This way of thinking about resilience leaves most of the ontogenetic picture a mystery. In the following review we put forth the Everyday Stress Resilience Hypothesis, in which resilience is analysed from a systems perspective and seen as a process of regulating everyday life stressors. Successful regulation accumulates into regulatory resilience, which emerges during early development from successful coping with the inherent stress in typical interactions. These quotidian stressful events lead to activation of behavioural and physiological systems. Stress that is effectively resolved in the short run and with reiteration over the long term increases children’s, as well as adults’, capacity to cope with more intense stressors. Infants, however, lack the regulatory capacities to take on this task by themselves. Therefore, through communicative and regulatory processes during infant–adult interactions, we demonstrate that the roots of regulatory resilience originate in infants’ relationships with their care givers and that maternal sensitivity can help or hinder the growth of resilience.

Jennifer Lehmann, in her reflections on out-of-home care (OOHC) in the preceding paper, offers an important contribution to this special issue of Children Australia (Lehmann, 2015). We are honoured to be involved and to provide this response.