Dale A. Blyth

Moving into Adolescence : The Impact of Pubertal Change and School Context

From the sociological point of view, adolescence traditionally has been described as a period of physical maturity and social immaturity. Adolescents reach physical adulthood before they are capable of functioning well in adult social roles. The disjunction between physical capabilities and socially allowed independence and power and the concurrent status ambiguities are viewed as stressful for the adolescent in modern Western society. It has been assumed that the need to disengage from parents during these years will result in high levels of rebellion and parent-child confl ict. Moving into Adolescence follows students as they make a major life course transition from childhood into early adolescence.

Beyond the “Village” Rhetoric: Creating Healthy Communities for Children and Adolescents

The role of community in child and adolescent development is emerging as a significant area of theoretical inquiry, research, and application. This article describes the development and utilization of a comprehensive community change effort designed to increase the attention of all community members toward strengthening core developmental processes for children and adolescents. It describes the development of 2 theoretical constructs, that of developmental assets and of asset-building communities. It presents a conceptual overview of both constructs, a descriptive account of the developmental assets within a large aggregate sample of approximately 99,000 sixth to twelfth graders, and a summary of change strategies shaping asset-building movements in over 200 communities.

The Effects of Service-Learning on Middle School Students’ Social Responsibility and Academic Success

The effects of service-learning on social responsibility and academic success were investigated among a large, racially and socioeconomically diverse sample of students in Grades 6 through 8 in three middle schools. Over the school year, service-learning students maintained their concern for others’ social welfare, whereas control students declined on those concerns. Service-learning students, especially girls, also declined significantly less than did controls in their frequency of talking with parents about school. Compared with other students, students with substantial hours of service-learning, a lot of reflection, and a high degree of motivation attributed to service-learning, significantly increased their belief in the efficacy of their helping behaviors, maintained their pursuit of better grades and their perception that school provided personal development opportunities, and decreased less in their commitment to classwork. The results indicate that service-learning can positively affect students’ social responsibility and academic success.

Self-Esteem and Achievement of Black and White Adolescents.

This study measures the self-esteem and academic achievement of 798 black and white adolescents as they move from sixth to seventh grade in a large Midwestern city. Our findings, in many instances, do not fit widespread preconceptions, but support other recent, large-scale quantitative studies. The basic findings involving selfesteem are as follows: (1) black children appear to have higher, rather than lower, self-esteem than whites; (2) girls of both races demonstrate lower self-esteem than do boys, with white girls exhibiting the lowest self-esteem of all; (3) among black children, those from broken families fare worse in terms of self-esteem in desegregated than in segregated schools. In terms of academic achievement, school desegregation is related to the marks the black children receive in school and their achievement in standardized tests. The black children in segregated schools receive somewhat higher marks than their desegregated peers, but score significantly lower in national standardized tests even when parental occupation, parental education, family structure and the childs educational aspirations are held constant.

Communities as Contexts for Adolescent Development An Empirical Analysis

Research on the relation between context and adolescent development has been driven by an awareness of increases in problem behaviors during adokscence and an interest in the role of contextualfactors that may affect adolescent outcomes. The present study focused on cross-sectional views of changes in youths over time and compared 12 different conmnunities as experienced by 9th through 12th graders, using the community as the main unit of analysis. The analyses demonstrated that very different percentages of youths in different types of community experience community strengths. In addition, similar types of youths (i.e., vulnerable, average, and high-asset youths) are affected differentially by the overall health of the community. In particular, vulnerable youths, those with few personal assets, benefit from living in healthier communities and these effects are visible across all types of communities. Analyses also revealed grade differences among different types of youths.

An Analysis of the Functional Nature of Adolescents' Supportive Relationships

A sample of 359 seventh and eighth graders completed the Social Support Functions Inventory to describe the amount of support they received in eight separate dimensions of social support from mothers, fathers, nonparental adults, and peers who helped them cope with a recent stress event. Similar levels of support were found across several of the relationship categories, suggesting that, with the exceptions of distraction and substance use, which are primarily available from peers, support functions are not highly specialized in particular relationships. Additional analyses (one that examined support from mothers and one that examined support from peers) found that the amount of support provided by a given relationship can vary considerably when that same relationship appears in different network structures. These findings suggest that the functionality of a supportive relationship should not be studied independent of the network structure in which it is embedded.

Let’s Talk After-School: The Promises and Challenges of Positive Youth Development for After-School Research, Policy, and Practice

The field of after-school programming for youth has grown substantially in the past 25 years, theoretically, methodologically, and practically. With increasingly sophisticated developmental lenses (e.g., positive youth development) and methods (e.g., mixed methods, advanced growth modeling techniques), we are now at a point where the field is ready for more and better integration of research and practice. We present an overview of both what is known and what the field needs to address to optimize program opportunities to best serve all youth. We focus on three major areas: (a) understanding what after-school programs do; (b) how we study after-school programs, and; (c) what we do with the resulting evidence. We argue that researchers, practitioners and policy makers must hone conceptual models, constructs and measures, evaluation designs, and practical and theoretical questions about after school programming to provide information that is useful in determining not only whether particular programs are helping youth, but also how they are helping and how they could help more.

Expanded learning time and opportunities: Key principles, driving perspectives, and major challenges

If expanded learning is going to make a real difference, then three key principles must inform how communities overcome challenges and assure equitable access to learning opportunities.

My Journey With Peter: Moving Ideas That Matter

Youth development lost a pioneer and a champion, Peter Benson, in October. Peter was a pioneer whose ideas mattered and a champion of approaches to research and its use in the community that has made a difference around the world. Peter Benson’s work, life, and spirit have helped transform our understanding of young people, what it takes to support their development, and our collective responsibility for their success. He also transformed me as a professional.