Risk and Protective Factors of Emotional and/or Behavioral Disorders in Children and Adolescents: A Mega-Analytic Synthesis

Professionals working with children who have severe emotional/behavioral disorders (E/BD) need to understand the risk and protective factors (RPFs) that are correlated with the development of these behavior patterns, for at least 3 reasons. First, significant numbers of students experience negative outcomes or fail to achieve positive outcomes. Second, current policy imperatives dictate a consideration of RPFs as preventive strategies. Finally, a consideration of RPFs affects children's response to intervention. The question posed in this research has three parts: (a) Can RPFs be identified? (b) Can the contexts in which the factors arise be identified? (c) Can the magnitude of the relationships between RPFs and associated outcomes be quantified? The current synthesis examined the findings of multiple meta-analyses and considered a broad range of RPFs across multiple contexts.