The transformative approach to mediation and third-party intervention is seen as attractive by many practitioners, but they are still somewhat unsure of its precise contours in practice. To clarify these contours, the authors describe ten major patterns of practice that they believe characterize the work of intervenors who follow this approach. These "hallmarks" of transformative practice rangefrom the content of mediators' opening statements, to their attitudes about party competence and motivation, to their willingness to deal with emotion and conflict history. Togethel; the hallmarks paint a clearer picture of this approach to intervention. They also help clarify some misunderstandings that have arisen about the approach.This special issue of Mediation Quarterly is dedicated to a discussion of the possibilities for implementing what we have called a transformative approach to mediation practice (Bush and Folger, 1994)+mphasizing the concrete steps that this involves and offering several illustrations of how mediators and other intervenors are currently putting this approach into practice. In h s lead article, we offer ideas about the key elements or commitments that characterize a transformative approach to mediation practice-that is, an approach centered on mediation's transformative dimensions: empowerment and recognition. Articulating these key elements will, we think, concretize the lunds of specific practices involved in a transformative approach and clarify its basic principles and characteristics. Trans formative Framework Moving from Theory to PracticeIn programs offering training in the transformative approach to mediation, we often begin by asking practicing mediators to describe one of their most highly

Children's imitations were analysed as a function of parental speech acts for six children in early Stage I of language acquisition. The relative frequency with which children imitated mothers reflected the relative frequency with which mothers imitated children (Spearman rank correlation = 0·77). Although parents' imitative expansions could all be categorized as having primary speech act functions (e.g. request for information) from the parents' point of view, expansions constituted a separate class of speech events in terms of children's responses. The children imitated imitations far more frequently than non-imitative speech acts in the same category. These findings suggest that individual differences in children's propensity to imitate may arise from the degree to which parents provide a model of imitation as a speech act.

Should the mediator remain neutral?