Frits van Wel

The Parental Bond and the Well-Being of Adolescents and Young Adults.

In this work, changes in the parental bond and the well-being of adolescents and young adults in the Netherlands are investigated. It concerns a longitudinal study among youngsters in the age of 12 to 24 (their ages varying between 15 and 27 when assessed for the second time 3 years later). In total, 1688 adolescents/young adults (730 boys and 958 girls) participated. We found a curvilinear development pattern in the bond between daugthers and their parents. Only the bond between sons and their parents became somewhat less positive in the transition from early to middle adolescence. Our general conclusion, however, is that adolescents and young adults maintain a rather good and reasonably stable relationship with their parents. Parents also prove to be of lasting importance for the psychological well-being of their upgrowing children, daughters in particular.

Transitional Phase or a New Balance?: Working and Caring by Mothers With Young Children in the Netherlands

In recent years in the Netherlands, mothers’ labor participation has increased sharply. This article examines which factors influence mothers’ employment rates and the division of household and caring responsibilities between parents. From research among 1,285 women with young children, it appears that cultural factors rather than economic motives or institutional obstacles offer the most important explanation for whether they work or not. A culture of care dominates more among women with lower than higher education levels, which clarifies the more limited labor participation of lower educated mothers. A comparison is also drawn between the various earner types of family. It appears that the one-and-a-half earner type of family with the man working full-time and the woman part-time is particularly popular among women with lesser education levels. However, for women with higher educations, the ideal is for both parents to work part-time, but for the time being, they have not yet been able to realize this.

A Risky Boundary: Unwanted Sexual Behaviour among Youth.

Abstract The aim of this research was to explore unwanted sexual behaviour amongs young people. Sexual aggression was operationalized at three levels: “verbal”, “non-verbal/intimidating” and “physically violent”. A total of 1,700 Dutch adolescents completed a questionnaire that included six clusters of possible determinants of unwanted sexual behaviour: background characteristics, personality characteristics, family environment, school environment, friends and deviant behaviour and sexuality and relationships. We found that victims of unwanted sexual behaviour are often perpetrators, and perpetrators are often victims. The adolescent phase can be a time of sexual exploration for many young people when they explore their own boundaries and those of others. In so doing they run the risk of transgressing boundaries and thereby becoming a victim or perpetrator of unwanted sexual behaviour.

Careful or lenient? Welfare reform for lone mothers in the Netherlands

The 1996 welfare reform that attempted to get lone parents out of social assistance represents a major shift in social policy in the Netherlands. Instead of having the financial right to care for their children, lone mothers are now obliged to earn their living by paid work as soon as their youngest child reaches the age of five. This policy shift is accompanied by additional incentives to support lone mothers in engaging in (part-time) work. Nevertheless, the measure has met considerable resistance among lone mothers as well as the caseworkers and municipalities that have been granted discretionary powers to implement the new law. Several years after its introduction, it can be concluded that the law has not been very successful; only slightly more than one out of ten lone mothers have actually left social assistance. In this article, we explain these meagre results by analysing the assumptions and incentives of the national policies, and by describing the mechanisms of discretion at a local level.

Fast on 200 beats per minute. The Youth Culture of 'Gabbers' in the Netherlands

The youth culture of gabbers has been the most remarkable Dutch youth culture of the past decade. It has been subjected to many years of negative stereotyping in the media. In this article, a study is presented among 1,147 Dutch adolescents, comparing gabbers to their “normal” peers. The results show that gabbers clearly differ in their taste for music and clothes but differ less than expected in their ideas about a normal way of life, foreigners, enjoying life, and drugs.

Ethnicity and youth cultural participation in the Netherlands.

Introduction The cultural integration of ethnic minority youth has been a source of concern in the Netherlands, as they scarcely appear to avail themselves of existing cultural resources. Little is known about their cultural preferences and thus far most Dutch research on cultural participation has been limited to the nonminority population (Ganzeboom, 1989; Ter Bogt & Van Praag, 1992; Van Beek & Knulst, 1991). These studies indicate that Dutch youth generally show little interest in the higher forms of art and culture; the vast majority reserve their enthusiasm for manifestations of youth or mass culture. Dutch research has also shown that adolescents receiving upper-level (e.g., pre-university) secondary education demonstrate a greater interest in art and culture than their peers, and that girls show more cultural interest than boys. Between the ages of 12 and 17, girls engage in more artistic activities than boys (e.g., playing music, dancing, acting, weaving, drawing); girls also attend more artistic performances and visit more cultural institutions (e.g., classical concerts, the theater, pop concerts, museums, the cinema) (Central Statistical Office, 1993; Van Beek & Knulst, 1991; Van Wel, Kort, Haest, J Knulst, 1989). According to Van Beek and Knulst (1991), the example set by parents is a key factor; they found a particularly strong connection between the cultural participation of mothers and that of their children. However, research by Van Wel (1994) suggests that cultural transmission within the family proceeds along sex-specific lines: cultural interests are passed on from father to son and from mother to daughter. Friends can also inspire cultural enthusiasm, but according to De Waal (1989) youth tend to discourage one another from embracing the higher forms of art and culture. Ter Bogt (1990) found that youth who had developed a particular cultural interest could always name someone in their environment who had inspired the interest. The existing research thus indicates that the cultural participation of Dutch youth is associated with sex, educational level, and the cultural interests of family members, notably parents. So far little attention has been given to ethnicity as a factor in cultural participation. However, ethnicity has been investigated in American research on leisure-time allocation, suggesting that ethnic minorities show low levels of participation in most forms of recreation outside the home. In the American research no special attention has been payed to cultural participation as it is defined in this article. The low levels of minority participation are usually explained within the framework of the marginality-ethnicity paradigm (Carr & Williams, 1993; Floyd & Gramann, 1993; Hutchison, 1987, 1988; Stamps & Stamps, 1985; Washburne, 1978). The marginality hypothesis states that the disadvantaged socio-economic position of ethnic minorities leads to their marginalization, which is in turn responsible for their low rates of participation. Explanations in terms of ethnicity, on the other hand, focus on cultural differences in leisure-time activities or preferences. The debate over the relative contribution of social class and ethnicity remains unresolved; intra-ethnic variation and cultural diversity impede a clear view of the influence of these two factors. The Netherlands is a society experiencing changes in its ethnic composition. In the 1960s and 1970s thousands of Moroccan and Turkish laborers migrated to the Netherlands. In the 1980s, the Netherlands began admitting the wives and children of these laborers as immigrants, which has led to a sharp increase in the number of ethnic minorities. In the 1970s there was also considerable immigration from former Dutch colonies such as Suriname. …

Youth cultural styles: From snob to pop?

This research examines whether opposition between higher and lower forms of youth culture still contributes to the emergence of groups with different cultural tastes. Do youth at higher levels of secondary education (for example, pre-university education) tend to display ‘omnivorous’ tastes nowadays (Peterson, 1992), just as highly educated adults do? A sample of Dutch adolescents (N = 226) completed a questionnaire concerning their preferences in several cultural domains (music, film and television, light reading and literature, receptive cultural participation). Four groups or clusters representing cultural styles were identified: omnivores, moderate omnivores, a group interested primarily in popular culture, and a culturally disinterested group; each group comprised about a quarter of the sample. Whereas girls were overrepresented in the first two groups, boys were more common in the latter two groups. The two groups with omnivorous tastes appear to fit the profile of ‘normal’ youth. Otherwise, the four cultural groups could not be linked to specific youth subcultures.

Adolescents and Fear Appeals

ABSTRACT As part of a study into ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ informative television advertisements 784 Dutch adolescents were asked to evaluate ten television advertisements about safe sex, road safety and smoking. These short films did not differ much in terms of effectiveness. Variables that play a central role in theories on fear arousal (severity, vulnerability, response and self-efficacy) also proved to be of (some) importance in this study. Almost half of the smokers showed a defensive response to the anti-smoking message (fear control), whereas a small majority indicated that they wanted to stop smoking (danger control).

Child Support Grants in South Africa: A Pathway to Women's Empowerment and Child Well-being?

Despite the growth of cash transfers to reduce poverty, promote child and family well-being and womens empowerment, the gender dynamics and impact of social protection remains poorly understood. We hypothesise that poor female care-givers receiving a cash transfer for their children are better able to contribute to the material and social well-being of their children than female care-givers who do not receive a cash transfer. This paper reports results of a household survey in one of the poorest wards in Johannesburg, South Africa. Structural equation modelling is used to analyse the data. We found that cash transfers increase womens individual income, which is in turn positively associated with increased financial independence, decision-making power over financial resources and decisions about childrens well-being. Beneficiaries were more actively engaged in care activities with their children. There are two implications for the insertion of gender and care into social protection policies. First that it is not necessary to attach behavioural change conditions to social protection policies in order to stimulate female care-givers to be more engaged in developmental activities with their children. Second, there is no risk of promoting a maternalistic model of care or ‘maternalism’ in the South African context as the transfer contributes to both womens individual incomes and their financial decision-making power.

Psychosocial Factors Predicting Job Search Behaviour of Long-Term Welfare Recipients in the Netherlands

In spite of active labour market policies, a considerable number of welfare recipients in the Netherlands are long-term unemployed. In order to investigate the job search behaviour of this group, we developed a model of job search behaviour, inspired by the theory of planned behaviour, expectancy value theory and self-determination theory Survey data relating to 193 individuals receiving welfare benefits for at least one year were collected. A model, consisting of six social-demographic and eight social and psychosocial variables, was tested with hierarchical multiple regression. Seven factors were found to be positively related to job search behaviour: being a non-Western immigrant, having recently started receiving welfare benefits, receiving encouragement in searching for work from an intimate social network, having a job search requirement imposed, having an expectation of finding a job, individual work valence and job search attitudes. Of these, duration of welfare assistance, the encouragement of an intimate social network, work valence and job search attitude appeared to be mediating factors. The article concludes that activation policy might benefit from a combination of improving job searching attitudes, for instance by discussing ideas about the valence of employment and expectations of success or by considering potential barriers to finding employment within social networks, and introducing a clear requirement to search for jobs, in particular for native Dutch, single mothers and people who have been in receipt of benefits for a long period of time. Such policies have been absent in the Netherlands for a long time, priority being given to those with better chances in the labour market.