Introduction to Special Section: Continuing our Tribute to Dan Offer

Excerpt

On November 9–10 of 2006, a small group of researchers gathered at the Institute for Juvenile Research to honor Dan Offer’s contributions to the study of adolescence (see Levesque 2007a). Several of the papers that resulted from the conference were printed in this journal, in the first issue of volume 36, 2007. That issue revealed the remarkable depth and breadth of Dan’s influence on the participants as well as the study of adolescence. The collection of papers examined several vibrant areas of study. For example, some of the articles addressed cutting-edge issues dealing with adolescence’s diversity, such as diversity emerging from age (Arnett 2007), ethnicity (Gaylord-Harden et al. 2007), and sexual orientation (Cohler and Hammack 2007). Other articles dealt with vulnerabilities and opportunities associated with adolescents’ developmental tasks, such as those ranging from risk-taking (Alberts et al. 2007), to family and community connections (Larson et al. 2007), psychopathology (Rutter 2007), depression (Steinhausen et al. 2007), and to resilience (DiRago and Vaillant 2007). The impressive collection of papers revealed, among other things, that the study of youth and adolescence flourishes as it continues to delve deeply just as much into established areas of research as into new ones. …