A social problem is an issue within the society that makes it difficult for people to achieve their full potential. Poverty, unemployment, unequal opportunity, racism, and malnutrition are examples of social problems. So are substandard housing, employment discrimination, and child abuse and neglect. Crime and substance abuse are also examples of social problems. Not only do social problems affect many people directly, but they also affect all of us indirectly. The drug-abusing driver becomes the potential traffic accident that doesn’t choose its victims by race, color, or creed but does so randomly. The child of abusive parents all too often becomes the victim or perpetrator of family violence as an adult.
Social problems tend to develop when we become neglectful and fail to see that serious problems are developing. Between 1988 and 1993, for example, the United States saw a phe- nomenal increase in youth violence. In my book about children who commit violent acts (Glicken, 2004b), I documented that children younger than age 12 cause one third of all fires resulting in death and that the average age of children who sexually abuse other children is younger than age 10. According to Osofsky and Osofsky (2001), “The homicide rate among males 15–24 years old in the United States is 10 times higher than in Canada, 15 times higher than in Australia, and 28 times higher than in France or Germany” (p. 287). These are troubling examples of social problems that affect all of us.