oa Editorial: Adolescent Psychiatry—Past, Present, and Future

I am delighted to introduce the inaugural issue of Adolescent Psychiatry in its new quarterly format. The new version of Adolescent Psychiatry continues the tradition of this distinguished series, published from 1971-2008 as a hardcover annual volume. Inaugurated two years after the inception of the American Society for Adolescent Psychiatry in 1969, Adolescent Psychiatry was published for many years with Sherman Feinstein as its very able Editor-in-Chief and Peter Giovacchini as coeditors. Max Sugar, Richard Marohn, and I, also served as Editors-in-Chief. The late 1960s were a time of student protests and riots, communes and hippies. These developments challenged society to understand disaffected youth and spurred the study of the phenomenon of adolescence and the formation of ASAP. From its inception, Adolescent Psychiatry explored the roots of adolescence as a biological, psychological and social phenomenon. Early volumes included many classic papers by such authors as Peter Blos, Erik Erikson, Otto and Paulina Kernberg, and Hans Kohut. In its early years and into the 1990s the series had a decidedly psychoanalytic perspective, which was brought to bear not only in the study of individual patients, but in attempts to understand social movements as well. But, from the beginning, Adolescent Psychiatry began to introduce a broad range of topics such as normal development, inpatient treatment, family therapy, and social and community psychiatry, as they pertained to the adolescent. As neurobiology and psychopharmacology advanced these topics were included as well. Volume 30, the last hardcover volume, was published 2008 in the midst of a sea change in publishing. Questions were being raised about whether that the old model of print publication of journals could continue. Publication costs had risen and it looked as though print publication itself might be doomed. Scholars, researchers, and students no longer went to libraries to research topics of interest, but surfed on line to find content. In addition, many authorities were questioning why readers should have to pay to read about work that was funded by public funds, such as government grants (which they had already funded by taxes). The notion of “open access” developed, promoted by such organizations as the Soros Foundation. The National Institutes of Health in the US and many other foundations and agencies around the world established a rule that publications based on work that they fund must be made freely available. Under the open access rubric, the costs for publication are shifted to authors. A new generation of open access on-line journals began to appear. Today nearly all journals are published on-line, with some having only on-line publication. There is a range in terms of access, with some having only pay per view or subscriptions, others having only some articles freely available, and still others being totally open access. Our new publisher, Bentham Science Publishers has journals that fit all of these models. Adolescent Psychiatry follows a hybrid model with articles being made open-access at the discretion of their authors. Thus there is no obligation for authors to pay to have their work published, but they may pay for the work to be freely available if they wish. We have a very wide range of options, including posting supplementary material such as assessment instruments or slide presentations online, with links to it from the journal. ADOLESCENT PSYCHIATRY TODAY With all these changes, some things have not changed. The primary readership of Adolescent Psychiatry has always been clinicians who work with adolescents. The new journal will retain its emphasis on articles that offer syntheses of topics relevant to adolescent development, psychopathology, and treatment of the adolescent patient. It will include reviews, research articles, and case reports. As time goes on, it will also have sections for letters to the editor and book reviews. In addition, there will be issues that focus on a single emerging topic of adolescent psychiatry, composed of invited articles, and coordinated by a guest editor. Adolescent Psychiatry will continue to reflect the view that adolescence is quintessentially a biological, psychological and social phenomenon, and work with adolescents can never be reduced to a simplistic approach. IN THIS ISSUE This issue includes articles on borderline personality disorder and bipolar disorder in adolescents, cybercruelty, immigrant adolescents, research on identity and self-esteem, and psychotherapy. Several articles deal with the challenges presented by difficult to reach and difficult to treat adolescents, reminding us that, although informed by such research as that on attachment, psychotherapy with adolescents is still an art....