Jonathan M. Tirrell

An Integrated Conceptual Framework for the Development of Asian American Children and Youth

The diversity of circumstances and developmental outcomes among Asian American children and youth poses a challenge for scholars interested in Asian American child development. This article addresses the challenge by offering an integrated conceptual framework based on three broad questions: (a) What are theory-predicated specifications of contexts that are pertinent for the development of Asian American children? (b) What are the domains of development and socialization that are particularly relevant? (c) How can culture as meaning-making processes be integrated in conceptualizations of development? The heuristic value of the conceptual model is illustrated by research on Asian American children and youth that examines the interconnected nature of specific features of context, pertinent aspects of development, and interpretive processes.

Youth–Adult Relationships and Positive Youth Development

Resources to promote positive development in young people have been identified in many contexts such as families, schools, neighborhoods, and out-of-school time programs. The most important resources within these contexts are the relationships that young people have with committed, caring adults. In this chapter, we provide an overview of research, based on findings from the 4-H Study of Positive Youth Development (PYD) and other scholarly work, on the essential role of adults in promoting PYD. We provide examples of organizations that have applied this research to their programming and practices to impact the well-being of young people. Finally, we provide priorities for practice and policy based on these findings. Specifically, we recommend that programs promote positive parenting behaviors, build cultural competence among their staff, engage parents more fully in programs, train staff and the youth in relationship-building skills, and thoughtfully consider how they create mentoring matches. Policy makers should invest in creating supportive youth systems in which youth voices are heard, such as family support programs and comprehensive community initiatives, to promote youth thriving.

Positive Youth Development Among Minority Youth: A Relational Developmental Systems Model

We present an overview of the positive youth development (PYD) perspective and the relational developmental systems (RDS) metatheory that frames this perspective. We describe the Lerner and Lerner model of PYD, and some of the findings from the 4-H Study of PYD regarding how thriving can be promoted among America’s diverse youth. We also address limitations of this research, including the lack of a representative sample of minority youth participants in this study. We discuss how further RDS-based PYD research may be designed with the explicit goal of addressing some of the limitations of past work. We present implications for applying what we have learned from PYD research to programs that aim to promote thriving among minority youth in the U.S. and internationally.

Modeling Pathways of Character Development across the First Three Decades of Life: An Application of Integrative Data Analysis Techniques to Understanding the Development of Hopeful Future Expectations

There were two purposes of the present research: first, to add to scholarship about a key character virtue, hopeful future expectations; and second, to demonstrate a recent innovation in longitudinal methodology that may be especially useful in enhancing the understanding of the developmental course of hopeful future expectations and other character virtues that have been the focus of recent scholarship in youth development. Burgeoning interest in character development has led to a proliferation of short-term, longitudinal studies on character. These data sets are sometimes limited in their ability to model character development trajectories due to low power or relatively brief time spans assessed. However, the integrative data analysis approach allows researchers to pool raw data across studies in order to fit one model to an aggregated data set. The purpose of this article is to demonstrate the promises and challenges of this new tool for modeling character development. We used data from four studies evaluating youth character strengths in different settings to fit latent growth curve models of hopeful future expectations from participants aged 7 through 26 years. We describe the analytic strategy for pooling the data and modeling the growth curves. Implications for future research are discussed in regard to the advantages of integrative data analysis. Finally, we discuss issues researchers should consider when applying these techniques in their own work.

Examining Cross-Age Peer Conversations Relevant to Character: Can a Digital Story About Bullying Promote Students’ Understanding of Humility?

Successful character education programs are commonly marked by components including conversations about moral issues; however, little is known about what students actually talk about in such programs. Using initial data from the Arthur Interactive Media Buddy Project, this study examined whether a digital comic about bullying generated meaningful conversations surrounding humility. The sample was 52 cross-age peers in elementary school. Analyses involved an iterative, deductive-inductive coding process resulting in a total of ten codes, of which three were most readily identified in peers’ conversations: perspective taking, affect labeling, and empathic responding. Limitations and implications relevant to character education are discussed.

Configurations of Young Peoples’ Important Life Goals and Their Associations with Thriving

The aims of this study were to determine whether, and how, young people’s beyond-the-self life goals coexisted with other life goals, and whether having at least one beyond-the-self goal was associated with higher thriving (the Five Cs of Positive Youth Development [PYD]) and volunteering, compared to having either no goals, or goals that were only self-focused. The authors conducted latent class analyses among five school cohort groups using data from five studies (combined using integrative data analysis techniques). Across grade groups, the authors identified classes, which can generally be characterized by (1) low endorsement of goals, (2) prominence of helping others and contributing to community goals, (3) prominence of goals related to a good life (e.g., make money, friends, live an adventurous life), and (4) endorsement of most life goals. In the older two grade groups we identified additional classes: a group with a high endorsement of goals oriented at helping others and serving God/higher power in the undergraduate group, and a group with high endorsement of goals to create something new and make the world a better place in the graduate group. There were differences in the Five Cs of PYD and volunteering between the classes. The authors discuss the implications of these results for future research and practice regarding young people’s life goals.