ABSTRACT
The late 1980s marked the onset of intense scholarly interest in how children’s development is affected by economic resources at the family and neighborhood level. This trend, manifested most strikingly by the publication of numerous books and special issues of journals devoted to the topic, brought to the forefront questions about the processes that mediate and temper the adverse effects of family-level poverty and economic stress on children’s development (e.g., Duncan & Brooks-Gunn, 1997; Huston, Garcia Coll, & McLoyd, 1994; Korbin, 1992; McLoyd & Flanagan, 1990; Routh, 1994; Slaughter, 1988), the impact of living in poor versus economically advantaged neighborhoods (e.g., Brooks-Gunn, Duncan, Klebanov, & Sealand, 1993; Chase-Lansdale & Gordon, 1996; Duncan, Brooks-Gunn, & Klebanov, 1994; Jencks & Mayer, 1990), and the application of current research on poor children and families to policy and practice (Chase-Lansdale & Brooks-Gunn, 1995; Danziger & Danziger, 1995; Meyer, 1997; Slaughter, 1988).
