Most of us have grown accustomed to the poignant, painful image of a child soldier's "troubled return to civilian life. 'They are walking ghosts,' mourns a recent New York Times editorial, 'damaged, uneducated pariahs.'" Chris Blattman blogs at the Center for Global Development about a study that takes a closer look at the experiences these child soldiers have entering back into daily life. Recent movies, novels and memoirs certainly color our view of child soldiers, writes Blattman, but according to recent research -- and contrary to most depictions -- many former child soldiers "live not as marginal people or criminals but as mothers, fathers and citizens." That image is a far cry from Uzodinma Iweala's (highly acclaimed) novel on the subject, "Beasts of No Nation."

How fortunate for all of us (and especially for the youth in question) that these images contradict the reality of most formerly recruited children. Indeed, an emerging body of research is dispelling many of these child soldering myths. Unfortunately, these same myths continue to dominate and distort policy aimed at preventing child recruitment and reintegrating children associated with armed groups.

Over the past two years I have worked with a psychologist, two human rights researchers, and several NGOs on studies of war affected youth in northern Uganda, the findings of which challenge conventional wisdom and policy...

Material suffering is raised by youth far more often more than nightmares and rejection. Juma, 28 years old, had been abducted by the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) for four years as an adolescent. "What hurt me most," he said, "is that they stopped my education." Indeed, losses of education and work experience are the largest and most prevalent impact of child soldiering among males, but largely because of time away rather than violence and brutality.

The trouble with the view of former child soldiers as time bombs and emotional cripples is that it leads us to regard reintegration into civilian life as hopelessly idealistic. Yet the real solutions--access to schooling, a leg up in livelihoods--are ones we know how to provide.

I'm sure Blattman would acknowledge that some child soldiers endure terrible trauma. But he is right -- and fulfilling the valuable role that the Center for Global Development plays on such morally weighty issues as poverty and conflict -- in finding a way to cut through the sensationalism to get at the facts. And like much we hear and see about Africa in the West, large parts of the story are untold.