Promoting Positive Pathways

Families struggling with trauma often have difficulty establishing secure relationships, setting the children up for a cascade of failures throughout life. Trauma, ranging from abuse and domestic violence to long-term illness or injury of a loved one, and homelessness, can seriously disrupt many aspects of normal development. A key factor to success is facilitating a child's resilience in the face of adversity.

To promote that resilience, Promoting Positive Pathways provides and evaluates three innovative evidence-based treatments, Child-Parent Psychotherapy (CPP), Attachment and Bio-Behavioral Catch-Up (ABC), and Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT). This three-year project provides services to 270 young children, (90 each year), many of whom have been placed in foster care as a result of traumatic experiences.

Promoting Positive Pathways establishes Mt. Hope Family Center as part of the prestigious National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN) and the only one in Western New York. Members will use the project's findings in developing training materials and national protocols for using CPP in treating trauma. National Child Traumatic Stress Network's Mission: To raise the standard of care and improve access to services for traumatized children, their families, and communities throughout the United States.

Principal Investigator
Sheree L. Toth, Ph.D.

Project Director
Jody Todd Manly, Ph.D.

Special Thanks To Our Funder
The U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) through the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services