Approaches to Positive Youth Development

Developmental scientists increasingly understand conditions that contribute to positive youth development and understand well what actually constitutes positive youth development itself. Despite such remarkable progress, much work continues to be needed to turn insights into policies that can shape institutions and personal relationships into environments that would foster positive development. Illustrative of the needed work is how the legal system could benefit from what would be deemed optimal policies for ensuring positive development, particularly because the legal system must rely on established legal principles and presumptions rather than even the best scientific evidence. This is particularly true in the United States, which renders that context an exemplar of limitations and possibilities. To understand U.S. law’s potential receptivity to scientific findings relating to youth development, this chapter provides the groundwork for understanding the foundations on which laws, policies, and other types of legal mandates relating to adolescents must rest – the Constitution and Supreme Court jurisprudence interpreting it. The analysis centers on the development of adolescents’ rights, the central limitations placed on them, and the many ways that social institutions retain the legal power to influence the development of youth. The chapter ends by delineating some of the key lessons gleaned from current jurisprudence and demonstrates how the legal system may be receptive to policies that would ensure appropriate consideration of the principles of positive youth development that continue to emerge from developmental science.

Within the framework of positive youth development (PYD) and life course theory, this study was designed to examine patterns of PYD and promotive factors over the first semester of Chinese high school with a sample of 480 students (boys, 43.96%). The growth mixture model identified four trajectories of PYD, labeled high start-fast decreasing, high start-low decreasing, low start-low increasing, and mid-persistent. Results also showed that membership in a PYD trajectory is significantly related to three promotive factors: parental involvement, teacher involvement, and intentional self-regulation. These findings have important theoretical and practical insights for a deeper understanding of the underlying mechanisms of positive development in adolescents following the critical period surrounding the transition to high school.

This article summarizes a much lengthier one that appeared in Prevention and Treatment. The earlier article grew out of a project initiated by the Department of Health and Human Services Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation. The Positive Youth Development Evaluation project described why policy makers, practitioners, and prevention scientists advocated a shift in approach for how youth issues are addressed in this country. The Positive Youth Development Evaluation project sought to define how youth development programs have been defined in the literature and then to locate, through a structured search, strong evaluations of these programs and summarize the outcomes of these evaluations. In the current article, we explain why prevention has shifted from a single problem focus to a focus on factors that affect both positive and problem youth development, describe what is meant by positive youth development, and summarize what we know about the effectiveness of positive youth develop...

BackgroundThe family is a very important institution that provides relationships and contexts for adolescents and can activate a trajectory of their positive development. Family-related adversity can endanger this development via associated negative emotions, such as feelings of hopelessness, hostility, and psychological distress. Therefore, we aimed first to explore the association of family-related adversity with positive youth development (PYD), and second whether psychological distress, hopelessness, and hostility mediate this association.MethodsWe obtained self-reported data from 308 Slovak adolescents (44.5% were boys, mean age = 12.55). Family-related adversity was measured using questions regarding the death of parents, divorce/separation, violence between parents, and parental substance abuse. Positive youth development was measured with the Very Short PYD questionnaire; psychological distress with the GHQ-12; hopelessness with the Hopelessness questionnaire and hostility with a subscale from the Aggression Questionnaire.ResultsWe found that family-related adversity was not associated with the first PYD component – internal values (regarding the domains of character and caring). However, it was negatively associated with its second component – self- and social efficacy (regarding the domains connection, competence and confidence): regression coefficient B= -0.32; 95%; confidence interval CI: -0.57 to -0.06). Next, we found that psychological distress (0.38; -0.50 to -0.26), hopelessness (-0.18; -0.31 to -0.05) and hostility (-0.23; -0.33 to -0.13) were associated with self- and social efficacy. Moreover, all potential mediators had statistically significant indirect effects: psychological distress − 0.11, hopelessness − 0.09 and hostility − 0.08.ConclusionThese findings may provide suggestions for programs supporting adolescents from families in adversity. These could be directed at better coping with psychological distress and addressing hostility and hopelessness.

Positive Youth Development, in the context of Physical Education, is an approach that prioritizes youth empowerment through physical activity and sports. Through physical activity intervened with a deliberately designed 5Cs and 7Cs program, youth can acquire motor skills, knowledge about health and fitness, and social skills needed for interacting with others. There is limited extensive research that specifically discusses PYD based on the 5Cs and 7Cs model in Physical Education. This article emphasizes the need for a more comprehensive analysis that explores the relationship between PYD and Physical Education implementing the 5Cs and 7Cs model. This study aimed to provide practical insights into how Physical Education can be designed and implemented to support positive youth development. By connecting theoretical studies with practical applications, it offers educators a framework for fostering resilience and positive development in students, which is currently limited in previous research. This study used the Systematic Literature Review method by reviewing Scopus-indexed international journals published in the last 10 years. The results of the study showed that research data in the 2012-2022 period experienced fluctuations. In 2021, the research trend was at its highest peak (14 articles), while the lowest research trend was in 2013 (1 article). It showed that the researcher interest in this topic could be more stable. The findings of the search results on this topic had not been extensively carried out. Only four research results and one chapter of a research book could be identified. Several research results used qualitative research methods (two articles) and survey methods (two articles). The authors did not find research using quantitative research methods on the 5Cs and 7Cs models, especially in Physical Education.

Positive Youth Development (PYD) is crucial for adolescent well-being, yet the interrelationships of its components, especially during early adolescence, remain underexplored. This study employed network analysis to investigate the central components of PYD and their sex and grade differences among 2,837 Chinese junior high school students (grades 7-9). The 5Cs Positive Youth Development Scale-Very Short Form (PYD-VSF) was used to measure the 5Cs: Competence, Confidence, Caring, Connection, and Character. Results revealed that "self-worth", "connection to family", and "bullied empathy" play a central role in the overall PYD network among adolescents. These nodes were also central in both sex-specific networks. However, their patterns of association with other nodes differed between boys and girls. Across grade levels, "self-worth" and attributes related to Connection and Caring consistently showed high centrality. Nevertheless, the degree of centrality, relative ranking, and specific patterns of association for these nodes differed across grades. These findings underscore the interconnected and complex systemic nature of PYD, calling for sex- and grade-sensitive interventions to effectively promote positive outcomes among youth.

To gauge the status of connections between the research literature about adolescent development and current theoretical and applied work pertinent to the concept of positive youth development (PYD), we assessed whether the adolescent development literature from 1991 to 2003 reflected a network of terms associated with PYD. A list of 16 terms potentially linked to PYD was generated by integrating conceptualizations of PYD presented in key scholarly publications and found among the ideas of scholars who are expert in the PYD perspective. The presence of these terms was then assessed in a set of nine leading development journals. The analysis of more than 5,500 article titles and abstracts indicated that a nomological network of concepts pertinent to PYD has not yet emerged in the research literature. We discuss possible reasons for the disparity between this sample of publications in developmental science and the growing theoretical and applied interest in PYD.

There is an unprecedented growth in the young population worldwide and especially in India and mental health of youth is an area of growing concern. The scope of convergence of the fields of positive youth development and mental health promotion among youth is becoming evident in the recent times. The paper aims to provide a brief overview of the field of PYD research in India and come up with implications for utilizing this framework for youth mental health promotion. A rapid review was carried out to examine Indian research on positive youth development and its relevance for mental health promotion through youth engagement. Two sets of key words, ‘Positive youth development’ and ‘India’ were jointly used as search words. The search was carried out in the month of April 2017, using EBSCO and ProQuest and MedIND as the electronic databases, with no restriction in the time-period of the published studies. A supplementary search of titles using Google search engine was done with eight Indian journals and one database for the period from 2010 till date. The search indicated significant paucity of Indian literature on positive youth development. A total of 24 articles were identified. Nine studies were retained of which six were non-intervention and three were intervention studies. The review suggests that PYD programs and PYD based mental health promotion programs are in a nascent stage in India with a dearth of published literature on the same. Implications for youth mental health promotion are highlighted.

The review of positive youth development programs by R. F. Catalano, M. L. Berglund, J. A. M. Ryan, H. S. Lonczak, and J. D. Hawkins (2002) is an important milestone in positive psychology. It documents the potential power of building strengths and competencies in children. The present commentary explores the relationship of positive psychology to prevention and the broader field of positive psychology. We focus on (a) the ways in which positive youth development can benefit from research recommendations that are commonly made in the treatment and prevention literatures and (b) how prevention science can benefit by incorporating a positive youth development approach. Finally, we suggest that the current field of positive youth development is limited in that it focuses primarily on building strengths to reduce negative outcomes such as substance abuse, violence, teen pregnancy, and academic failure. An important and exciting goal for future programs is to foster an equally broad range of positive outcomes.

Youth voice is gaining more attention globally as a core feature of program quality within positive youth development programs. Few studies have examined the relationship between youth voice and positive youth development in high power-distance cultures, however, where young people often face psychological barriers to exercising decision-making in their work with program adults. Research is needed on the psychological mechanisms that might help youth thrive within settings that are less structurally and psychologically supportive of youth voice. Drawing on bioecological systems and hardiness theories, this quantitative correlational study evaluates the moderating effect of psychological hardiness on the relationship between youth voice, the mediators of program safety and engagement, and the 6 C’s of positive youth development. A moderated mediation model was tested among 436 first-year undergraduate co-curricular program participants from public universities in Malaysia (M = 21.192 years, SD = 1.191 years; 65.6% female). Youth voice positively predicted positive youth development; the relationship was partially mediated by program engagement, but not safety. The mediated pathway through program engagement was more predictive for hardier youth. By combining programmatic and individual psychological factors into the hypothesized model, this research identifies the potential importance of hardiness on the practice of youth voice for young adults in high power distance cultures. The findings highlight the need to identify other individual and programmatic factors that may contribute to the development of positive youth development in diverse cultural settings.

Adolescent sexuality and reproductive health: where are we in 2004?

The family is a very important institution that provides relationships and contexts in which adolescents are included and where the trajectory of positive development can be activated. A family crisis can affect family functioning and endanger adolescent development. Therefore, we aimed to explore the association of crisis in the family with positive youth development (PYD), and further, whether adolescent-perceived family functioning mediates or moderates this relation. The sample consisted of Slovak adolescents (N = 341, 44% boys, mean age = 13.16) who completed questionnaires that included questions on family crisis and joint family activities, the Alabama parenting questionnaire and the Very Short PYD questionnaire in the baseline measurement of the Care4Youth cohort study. We found a positive association of perceived positive parenting (B = 0.51; p < 0.001) and family activities (B = 0.50; p < 0.001) with PYD, whereas crisis in the family (B = −0.42; p = 0.01) and perceived poor supervision (B = −0.30; p < 0.001) were negatively associated with PYD. Using serial mediation model, we found following pathway which connected crisis in the family with PYD: crisis in the family → perceived poor parental supervision → joint family activities → PYD. This implies that family interventions and counselling to support parenting skills, especially parental supervision and family activities, to those with the signs of an ongoing family crisis may help to counteract the negative effect of the family crisis on PYD.

Preventing problems vs. promoting the positive: What do we want for our children?

Consistent with the positive youth development perspective, the experience of internal and external assets is associated with positive development or thriving among young people. This proposal has been developed and tested mainly in the United States but it also appears to be considerably true for Roma youth living in post-communist countries. This chapter examines Roma youth (N = 354) experience of various developmental assets and how these assets are related to thriving. Study results indicated positive relations between the assets and thriving, in general. In addition, the experience of constructive use of time was quite low among Roma youth relative to internal assets, such as commitment to learning, positive values, social competencies, and positive identity, and other external assets such as support, empowerment, and boundaries and expectations. While this low experience of constructive use of time could be a general trend among young people, it could also reflect the discrimination and social exclusion that Roma youth often face. Because Roma youth across Europe form a significant and growing proportion of the school-age population and consequently the future workforce, policies and programs that promote both internal and external assets necessary for thriving are essential because thriving has been associated with the development of self and society.

Towards the completion of their tertiary education, students should have adapted to the work demands of the future. Career adaptability is determined by the student's character or personal assets. However, the influence of personal attributes on career adjustment is not always consistent. Other factors influence the strength of this influence. This research aims to determine the moderating role of academic achievement in the relationship between positive youth development (PYD) and student career adaptability. Data collection used the Positive Youth Development Scale and Career Adaptability Scale. We measured academic achievement using GPA. The research involved 286 eighth-semester students using a total sampling technique. Data analysis used a moderation test with Jamovi 2.0.0 statistical software. The results show that academic achievement moderates the impact of positive youth development on career adaptability. We found that PYD has a high effect on career adaptability in students with a high GPA. In contrast, PYD has low impact on career adaptability in students with low GPAs. The research results are beneficial in overcoming the low adaptability of students' careers by increasing positive youth development and academic achievement.