The treethinking challenge

Although the overwhelming majority of Jamaican children and adolescents are well adjusted, a sub-stantial group exhibits high levels of maladjustment and deficient functioning (1). A perfunctory review of Jamaican newspapers and television talk-shows reveals that violence, particularly violence perpe-trated by youths, is of major concern in every sector of Jamaican society. Although aggressive and vio-lent behaviors are not new in Jamaica, the recent es-calation of criminal violence among the adolescent population has become a major public policy issue and a serious public health problem. Violent activi-ties have become more vicious and the perpetrators more ruthless than what the typical Jamaican over 40 years of age is used to (M. Jones, Social Scientist