Brett Brown

Indicators of Child Well-Being: the Promise for Positive Youth Development

In the current U.S. indicators system, measures of child well-being focus primarily on negative outcomes and problems. We measure and track those behaviors that adults wish to prevent. For the most part, the indicators system does not monitor positive development and outcomes. Such a system of child well-being indicators lacks the breadth and balance required in a science-based measurement system. Moreover, it lacks measures of the kinds of constructs that resonate among adolescents themselves and adults. Measures are needed for multiple domains of development, including educational achievement and cognitive attainment, health and safety, social and emotional development, and self-sufficiency. Positive outcomes are often critiqued as soft, highlighting the importance of rigorous conceptualization and measurement, including conceptual clarity and face validity, age appropriate measures, and psychometric rigor. In addition, constructs and measures need to be presented in ways that are understandable to policy makers and the public and that work across varied subgroups and levels of governance. Ideally, comparable measures will be used for indicators, for program evaluation, and in basic research studies of child and adolescent development.

The Single-Father Family: Demographic, Economic, and Public Transfer Use Characteristics

SUMMARY This paper examines the demographic and economic characteristics of single-father families, with particular attention to public transfer receipt. Cohabiting and non-cohabiting single fathers are examined and compared to fathers in married-couple families. Estimates from the 1997 March, Current Population Survey (CPS) are featured. Selected trend data for 1984, 1989, and 1996 are also presented. The analyses show that single fathers earn substantially less than married fathers, have lower household incomes, are less educated, and are substantially more likely to be receiving public transfers. Further, the socioeconomic gap between single and married fathers has been increasing since 1984.

Promoting equal developmental opportunity and outcomes among America's children and youth: results from the National Promises Study.

Building on a developmental framework positing five types of assets or inputs needed for children’s development, referred to as promises, we investigated the extent to which American children and youth experience the five Promises articulated by the America’s Promise Alliance. These are: (1) Caring Adults, (2) Safe Places and Constructive Use of Time, (3) A Healthy Start, (4) Effective Education, and (5) Opportunities to Make a Difference. Data came from a nationally representative poll designed to assess these five resources and involved more than 4,000 teenagers and their parents. Results showed that only a minority of young people experienced rich developmental nourishment (having 4–5 of the Promises). Males, older adolescents, adolescents of color, and adolescents from families with less education and lower parental annual incomes were significantly less likely to experience sufficient developmental opportunities and were also less likely to experience desirable developmental outcomes. However, among those young people who reported experiencing 4–5 Promises, the great majority of demographic differences in developmental outcomes were either eliminated or significantly reduced. The results suggest that increasing children’s experience of these Promises would reduce developmental inequalities among America’s young people. Editors’ Strategic Implications: Longitudinal studies with representative samples will be necessary to further validate this approach and study causal contributions of assets, but this integration of Positive Youth Development frameworks holds great promise for theory, practice, and policy.

Preparing Indicators for Policymakers and Advocates

Indicators are the focus of intense interest in the policy community, particularly economic indicators. For example, indicators about the state of the economy, such as the unemployment rate, the poverty rate, housing starts, and inflation, are not only tracked over time but are awaited with anticipation and urgency and reported in headline stories in the media. The state of the economy affects the outcomes of elections, and the decisions made by government, including decisions made by the Federal Reserve, Congress, and the executive branch. Moreover, the data available for economic indicators are very up-to-date—for example, unemployment in the preceding month. Many citizens and policymakers would argue, though, that the state of the economy is not the only marker of a successful society (Hauser et al., 1997). The well-being of children would also rank high among the factors that signal the health and future prospects of a society. Indeed, we would suggest that indicators of child well-being represent an important and complementary strategy for monitoring the success of a society. Though not as fully evolved or up-to-date as economic indicators, the field of child and youth well-being indicators has come a long way in recent years. For example, the United States Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics (2001) produces an annual report, America’s Children: Key National Indicators of Well-being, and the Annie E. Casey Foundation has produced Kids Count to provide data at the state level for more than a decade. Given this progress, it is valuable to consider how indicators can be used correctly and effectively to inform public policy and program development by policymakers and advocates, as well as by the public. In the following sections, we highlight five hierarchical purposes of indicators and discuss the benefits and risks of using indicators for each of these purposes. We also suggest a number of criteria for using indicators so that they are both accurate and understandable, and briefly identify some presentation strategies that might help to communicate indicators of child well-being to policymakers.

A Federal Monitoring System for Early Adult Health

Federal statistical agencies have spent decades developing a robust system for monitoring the health of Americas adolescents at the national and state levels. More recently, the health of young adults (roughly 18-24 years of age) has received greater attention in public health and health policy discussions, yet relatively little is known about the nations capacity to effectively monitor the health of this age group. This article reviews existing federal data collection efforts and reporting systems to identify what pieces currently exist to support an effective health monitoring system for young adults and what is still needed, and makes recommendations for enhancing the current system by improving data access and quality. In particular, a major step toward establishing a recognizable health monitoring system for young adults can be taken simply by pulling together existing data into organized chartbooks and web portals that focus on this age group.