Child Guidance in Interwar Scotland: International Influences and Domestic Concerns

Child guidance was central to twentieth-century international programs of "mental hygiene," with the shift from an emphasis on children's physical health to concern with their mental health. In interwar Britain it was supported by American philanthropy and influenced by American practice, especially the latter's emphasis on the dominant role of psychiatry. In Scotland the psychiatric model undoubtedly gained purchase. But in a highly contested field this approach also encountered resistance from psychologists, while the powerful Catholic Church had strong views about the areas of child mental health and development into which psychiatry might be allowed to venture.