"Explaining why": a closer look at attributions in child abuse victims

In summary, the empirical and conceptual articles in this special issue examine victims' attributions from multiple perspectives, including abuse-specific, abuse-related, and general attributions as well as attributions made by children and adults abused as children. The commentaries examine attributions in relation to treatment and in the context of a model of child abuse sequelae. Together, these articles examine some of the clinical/therapeutic, measurement, and scientific implications of this emerging topical area (e.g., what types of attributions merit evaluation and with what types of methods, how and when do we best modify maladaptive attributions, what assessment and treatment studies are needed to examine the role of attributions). We hope these articles will stimulate colleagues working with all forms maltreatment who are interested in research and treatment pertaining to attribution styles in childhood victims. Despite the complexities involved, the rewards for understanding which children are most at risk and for designing more effective treatments are many.