ABSTRACT
This section delves deeper into the chronic dilemmas surrounding definitions of EBD (emotional and behavioural difficulties) and deciding which children are accurately placed in this imprecise category. Long ago, the Underwood Report noted the difficulties in Britain: EBD (then called ‘maladjustment’) was sometimes seen as a ‘within-child’ medical problem, but was also ‘a term describing an individual’s relation at a particular time to the people and circumstances which make up his environment’ (Ministry of Education 1955: 22). Forty years later, the English Department for Education (1994) offered a vague summary definition:
Children with EBD are on a continuum. Their problems are clearer and greater than sporadic naughtiness or moodiness and yet not so great as to be classed as mental illness.
