Includes bibliographical references and index.

Introduction : personal satisfaction and the welfare of families, communities, and society / Gary B. Melton -- Growing up in a socially toxic environment : life for children and families in the 1990s / James Garbarino -- The deterioration of the family : a law and economics perspective / Allen M. Parkman -- Community, family, and the social good : the psychological dynamics of procedural justice and social identification / Tom R. Tyler and Peter Degoey -- Social or individual orientation? : dilemmas in a post-communist world / Mati Heidmets -- Social networks and family violence in cross-cultural perspective / Jill E. Korbin -- Divorce and custody : the rights, needs, and obligations of mothers, fathers, and children / Eleanor E. Maccoby -- Epilogue : psychology, law, and the family / Ronald Roesch.