This article provides an update on a series of projects that have highlighted the issue of institutionalization of children in Europe, arguing that babies and small children aged less than 3 years old, with or without disability, should not be placed in residential care without a parent or primary caregiver.

This article briefly summarizes the literature on elements of research, practice, and policy pertaining to the development and care of children raised in institutions. It covers such children’s development while they reside in institutions and after their transition to adoptive or foster families.

The Deinstitutionalization Toolkit is designed to provide all those interested in institutional closures and expanded community living opportunities for people with intellectual disabilities and developmental disabilities (ID/DD) with information, strategies, state data, and case studies that can facilitate closure and build community capacity to serve more people with ID/DD in the community. It covers topics such as building a broad-based coalition, understanding and working within the political environment, creating a community system of care, and relevant laws, policies, and court decisions.

This chapter from Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development Volume 76, Issue 4 reviews the neurobiological literature on early institutionalization that may account for the psychological and neurological sequelae discussed in other chapters in this volume.

This chapter of Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development Volume 76, Issue 4 is devoted to the analysis of the ill effects of early institutional experiences on resident children's development.

This chapter from Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development Volume 76, Issue 4 reviews sensitive periods in human brain development based on the literature on children raised in institutions.

Attachment has been assessed in the extreme environment of orphanages, but an important issue to be addressed in this chapter of Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development Volume 76, Issue 4  is whether in addition to standard assessment procedures, such as the Strange Situation, the lack of a specific attachment in some institutionalized children should be taken into account given the limits to the development of stable relationships in institutionalized care.

This monograph reviews literature pertaining to children without permanent parents.

This study explores global growth suppression among children within institutional care settings.

This paper from Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development Volume 76, Issue 4 proposes a number of key components for translating research into policy and programs: analyzing the situation, using evidence to build the case for action, developing policies, building program capacity in child welfare and early childhood development, creating a family‐based child welfare system, and developing a system of monitoring and accountability.