• “Macro” controversies include debates over the role of values in defining psychiatric disorders, the relative roles of nature and nurture in the etiology of childhood behavioral and emotional disturbances, the problem of stigma as a potential cause for under-treatment, and the desire for diagnostic labels as a possible cause for over-treatment.
• "Micro” issues include debates over the safety, efficacy, and implementation of agreed-upon best practices.

Unfortunately, these debates usually occur in isolation, even though they are intimately connected, and people often talk past each other. If they do not receive an integrated, accessible analysis there can be no effective and productive discussion of them, and no progress toward resolving them.

Intended Products
A public symposium: 1-day free public symposium to be held in 2009 at the New York Academy of Sciences.

A web-based briefing: Prepared by NYAS and housed on the NYAS website, this free e-briefing will contain an overview of the project and the symposium.

A project report: A report intended to help researchers, clinicians, scholars, journalists, and parents understand the debates that surround the use of pharmacological treatments in children with behavioral disturbances, to be submitted for publication as a supplement to the Hastings Center Report.

A book of essays: An edited collection of scholarly essays based on presentations made at project meetings will be submitted for publication with an academic press.