Global public health has improved vastly during the past 25 years, and especially in the survival of infants and young children. However, many of these children, particularly in Africa, continue to live in poverty and in unhealthy, unsupportive environments, and will not be able to meet their developmental potential.

In conditions of extreme poverty and instability, conditions characteristic of Africa, the pressures on parents differ markedly from those facing parents in communities that are typically the focus of research in child development. This timely book addresses the dearth of literature in this area. Unlike other works on the subject it is Africa-wide in its scope, with case studies in Uganda, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya, Nigeria, Malawi and South Africa.