Prevention research has achieved greater applicability in the U.S. since the early 1980s, and both theories and practices of prevention have been advanced. In contrast, relatively little attention has been paid to the development of prevention research in Japanese contexts. The main purpose of this paper is to review the relevant literature in prevention research, as developed in the U.S., which focuses on the prevention of youth psychological maladjustment and problem behaviors and the promotion of well-being for the population as a whole. Based on theoretical frameworks that use epidemiological and developmental models, four prevention models are reviewed: The Risk Reduction Model, the Risk Protective Model, the Resilience Model, and the Positive Youth Development Model. Further, given the importance of integrating science into practice, the Community Partnership Model is also reviewed as it provides a context for implementation of intervention practices based on prevention research.

The stressors of living in a rapidly changing world are increasing rather than decreasing in Hawaii and all the world. These stressors influence our cultural milieu and way of life which, in part, lead to various forms of violence. A kindergarten/first grade classroom-intervention educates children and their parents using a multicultural peace curriculum and is aimed at transforming the school gradually. It also uses graduate counseling students in training to help conduct the peace intervention. It includes Hawaiian traditional values as clues to childiren’s guide toward non-violent solution of conflict and peaceful way of life. A more community oriented approach was organized to promote network of peace advocacy in Hawaii. The possibility and necessity of peace education in Japan from school counseling perspective is discussed.

The purpose of this presentation was to discuss community psychologists’ approach to global violence, such as bombing and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq by USA and allied countries. Although structural violence and global violence are often crucially influential to quality of life for human beings all over the world, the community psychologists’ effort for prevention of these kinds of violence are not well seen.T he problems of war seems intersection of real politics and academic effort of psychology. Attitudes of psychological societies in different countries and international levels toward the bombing and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq are described and criticized. Networking of psychologists for prevention of global violence was suggested.

Educational restructuring in special education is currently under way. The number of children who have severely/profoundly, multiply and diverse disabilities has increased in these days. It must be one of the main tasks to make solid treatment for these children and needs therefore support for progress of teacher’s expertise. This article presents a case report of school consultation that is aimed at improving teacher’s knowledge and skills in the field of special education. This investigation led us to consider that the main functional points of this consultation were as follows; (1) through the school consultation, consultant mainly offered psychological support to consultee, (2) consultant and consultee analyzed the educational process and shared mutual professional expertise for resolution of actual problem, (3) consultant offered technical information and skills to consultee on as-needed basis, (4) consultant built bridge between school and community and supported maintenance of its relation.

This school consultation functioned as an “on-site training” for improving teacher’s professional knowledge and skills. School consultation as community psychological intervention respects autonomy and empowerment of school, so a consultant is expected to be a effective intervenient who make a point of two way communicative process. Through this case study, a meaning and function of school consultation based on the communicative approach towards new special educational provision discussed.

The purpose of this study was to clarify the process of how a community becomes empowered. Data were collected by interviewing five community leaders in M town, A Prefecture, and analyzed qualitatively. Three stages were identified in the process of social support-networking. Stage I was actualization and sharing of a desire with people in the neighborhood; Stage II was initiation of collaborations by individuals; and Stage III was the coming together of these collaborations. Three features of social support networking were observed: 1) The development of networking activities was continually being driven by the needs and desire of the people; 2) Substantial collaboration was required to further develop the social support network; 3) the public health nurse managed the networking activities. It is suggested that the three stages and the features of social support networking are closely associated with community empowerment.

The present study investigates the extent to which mothers have emotions of guilt(Mothers’ Guilt; MOG) in relation to their children’s ages what situations induce MOG and, how the situation is affected by their use of social support resources. Thirty-five mothers having children of preschoolers, fifty-seven mothers of junior high school students, and forty-one mothers of college students were given a questionnaire regarding the degree of MOG, the situations inducing MOG, and social support resources for child-rearing. The results indicated that mothers of preschoolers and junior high school students felt MOG significantly more than mothers of college students. The MOG was experienced especially when they felt their care for preschoolers and junior high school students was inadequate, and when they felt their failure to provide mental support for junior high school students and college students. Moreover, the higher the MOG was, the more frequently social support resources were used. The mothers with high MOG for the preschoolers and junior high school students tended to exclusively rely on instrumental support resources and informational support. The mothers with high MOG for the college students tended to exclusively rely on intimate interaction. These results were discussed in terms of what kinds of social support resources should be offered to mothers with high MOG.

In developing community area networks, one of main problems is to make good uses of broadband networks to create and provide community-based infomation for the sake of matching people’s needs. In this study, we examined community area networks run by Ninjin-Net Kyogikai(non-profit organization act for community area networks) at Nagayo town in Nagasaki, based on our participant observations. In its activities, they considered that one of the most important things was to manage the community information system by themselves. Therefore, they independently developed the community information system using techniques of wireless LAN(IEEE.802.11b), and they run the independent community area networks covering the whole area of Nagayo town. They provided not only internet services to their members but also a large variety of community-based information on their web pages to Nagayo town people. Their goals were to encourage people to communicate each other through their community area networks and to get involved in the community development activities and community events. They still tried to provide more valuable community-based information by getting along with non profit organizations in other areas.