Child and Adolescent Development

FrameWorks has the world’s largest body of framing research on children and adolescents. It is used around the world to create change.

This research provides an overarching framing strategy to effectively communicate about a wide range of issues that affect children and young people.

Certain assumptions about children, youth, and families come up again and again.

To communicate effectively, advocates need to be able to navigate these dominant beliefs.

The tested frames come from research on six continents and have pushed policy in progressive directions at local, state, national, and international levels. Join this global narrative shift effort by exploring these resources.

Featured Work

Toolkit

Reframing Adolescence and Adolescent Development

This toolkit is a resource for communicators who want to change the narrative about adolescence and adolescent development.

From 10 to 25

What happens from ages 10 to 25? Find out as you take on the role of a young person, explore new parts of life, encounter challenges, and get the support you need.

Report

Talking About Racism in Child and Family Advocacy

As the field seeks to lead a more public conversation about the impacts of racism on children and families—and about how racism structures the systems that children and families interact...

All work

Showing 109 – 120 of 198

Report

“Just Do It” Communicating Implementation Science and Practice

How can we talk about evidence-based decisionmaking and implementation science in ways that build support for robust, intentional implementation efforts?

Report

Narratives of Child Maltreatment and Child Sexual Abuse in the Canadian Media

This report analyzes Canadian media coverage of child maltreatment and examines the impacts of these narratives on the public’s understanding of this issue.

Report

All Aboard: Explanatory Tools to Talk About Children’s Well-Being in Jacksonville

Systems thinking is hard - which makes explaining "systems of care" even harder. It helps to have a metaphor.

Toolkit

Promoting Public Understanding of Child Development in the UK

Welcome to Promoting Public Understanding of Child Development in the UK—a collection of framing research, recommendations, and sample communications.

Report

Science Does Not Speak for Itself: Translating Child Development Research for the Public and Its Policymakers

How can we translate the science of early brain and biological development? Partnerships between scientists and social scientists can help.

Report

Attending to Neglect: Using Metaphors and Explanatory Chains to Reframe Child Neglect in the United Kingdom

Because neglect is the absence of something, it can be hard for people to think about. Explanatory techniques can help us build understanding of child neglect.

Report

Framing Child & Youth Development: A FrameWorks MessageBrief

The National Human Services Assembly (NHSA), an association of leading national nonprofit human services organizations, is in the process of “reframing” human services.

Toolkit

Talking about Child Mental Health in Tennessee

Welcome to Talking about Child Mental Health in Tennessee — a compendium of communications research and resources for helping the public better understand issues such as child development, child...

Report

How to Talk About Early Childhood Development to an International Audience

It can be hard to make a case for early learning with stakeholders from the international development sector. Talking about the "multiplier effect" helps.

Report

Building a Road to Resilience

This Core Story creates narratives that help people think in new ways about prevention-based strategies to improving mental health outcomes in Germany.

Report

Pais Despreparados, Punições Mais Severas e O Efeito Dominó: Mapping the Gaps Between Expert and Public Understandings of Violence and Its Effects on Early Child Development in Brazil

This report, in Portuguese, compares how experts talk and Brazilians think about early childhood and early child development.

Report

Values and Metaphors for Communicating About Early Child Development in Brazil: A FrameWorks MessageMemo

This MessageMemo summarizes the findings from a comprehensive multi-method investigation of how Brazilians view early child development.