When Your Child is Afraid: Understanding the Normal Fears of Childhood from Birth Through Adolescence and Helping Overcome Them

Psychologist Schachter, director of New York's Children's Phobia Center, and McCauley, author of Pregnancy After 35, cover an intricate subject in this extensive guide. Supported by case histories, the text pinpoints ""normal'' fears affecting children from infancy through age 16. Descriptions of various fears precede advice on how to deal with childhood dreads before they become inhibiting phobias. Parents, guardians and teachers can learn to recognize symptoms listed in the book's Fear Survey Chart and in boxed paragraphs that summarize each chapter's focus. For example, babies and very small children are terrified of loud noises, losing their parents when left with a sitter, etc.; by stages, older children worry about rejection, failing in school, nuclear war, sexual assaults and many other possibilities, real or imagined. The authors provide guidance on behavior modification and other therapies when professional help is indicated. Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club alternates. (April)