Leslie Morrison Gutman

Resilience and Vulnerability: Adaptation among Youth Facing Multiple Risks: Prospective Research Findings

© Cambridge University Press, 2010 and Suniya S. Luthar 2003. The high prevalence of mental health problems among children in the United States has continued to stimulate service-oriented professionals to seek targets for preventive intervention. In a 1999 survey of youth risk behavior during the previous year (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2000), 28% of high school children felt blue or hopeless, 19% had considered suicide, and 8% had made an attempt. In terms of aggression, 36% had been in a physical fight. Academic problems were equally serious, with 30% of Hispanics dropping out before high school graduation compared to 14% of African Americans and 8% of whites. Although the majority of youth do not have such problems, the number who do is substantial. Understanding the pathways that have led to such problem behavior is an important precursor of any successful intervention. Prevention is intimately connected to developmental concerns because there is an expected time course in which activities in the present will influence activities in the future. Where the problem seems to be in the family, school, or peer group, intuitively interventions should take place in those settings and should have immediate impact. Unfortunately, most interventions in single domains have not produced major reductions in problem behavior. It appears that children typically experience multiple risks in multiple social contexts; consequently, it is unlikely that a “magic bullet” for prevention or intervention will be found (Masten & Coatsworth, 1998).

Stage-Environment Fit During Adolescence: Trajectories of Family Relations and Adolescent Outcomes

Within the framework of stage-environment fit theory, the authors examined the contribution of family relations to adolescent outcomes concurrently and longitudinally, as well as the moderating effects of gender and ethnicity in these associations. Data came from a longitudinal study of European American and African American families from a range of socioeconomic backgrounds. Results demonstrated that gender and ethnicity influenced both the level and rate of change in family relations and adolescent outcomes. Family relations contributed either concurrently or longitudinally to at least 1 of the adolescent outcomes. The effects of gender and ethnic moderation differed according to both the time frame and the outcome assessed.

The influence of family relations on trajectories of cigarette and alcohol use from early to late adolescence

The present study examines growth curve trajectories of cigarette and alcohol use from 13 to 19 years, and investigates how family relations (i.e., decision-making opportunities, negative family interactions, and positive identification with parents) relate to contemporaneous and predictive alcohol and cigarette use during adolescence. Data came from a longitudinal study of European American and African American families from a range of socioeconomic backgrounds (n = 1160 for alcohol use; n = 1102 for cigarette use). European Americans had higher levels and faster rates of alcohol and cigarette use than African Americans. European Americans females had the greatest likelihood of increased cigarette use. Negative family interactions and positive identification had contemporaneous and predictive associations with alcohol and/or cigarette use. Negative family interactions were related to increased smoking and drinking, whereas positive identification was associated with decreased use. Family relations differentially affected cigarette use according to ethnicity and gender, but had similar effects on alcohol use.

Parenting behaviours and children’s development from infancy to early childhood: changes, continuities and contributions

This study investigated trajectories of parenting behaviours and children’s development from infancy to early childhood, associations between parenting behaviours and children’s development and how these associations vary according to socioeconomic indicators. Mothers and children were examined from an ongoing longitudinal study of families resident in the geographic area of Avon in the UK. Using growth curve modelling, four waves of data were examined when the children were 6–42 months old. Findings suggest that timing is an important factor in the relationship between parenting and children’s development. The positive association between mother–child interactions and children’s development was evident 12 months later, whereas engagement in outside activities had both concurrent and later positive associations with children’s development. Maternal education was also highlighted as a significant moderator suggesting that interactive parenting may have a protective role for children whose mothers have lower education.

Is Uncertainty Bad for You? It Depends...

Parents and educators should be more concerned about uncertainty in educational aspirations than uncertainty regarding career choice among adolescents. Moreover, the impact of uncertainty on young peoples attainment varies by socio-historical context, the timing of uncertainty, the available resources, and individual characteristics of the adolescents themselves.

A Synthesis of Causal Evidence Linking Non-Cognitive Skills to Later Outcomes for Children and Adolescents

The concept of ‘non-cognitive skills’ was introduced by sociologists Bowles and Gintis (1976) as a catch-all phrase to distinguish factors other than those measured by cognitive test scores such as literacy and numeracy. The term “non-cognitive”, however, creates a “false dichotomy” between cognitive abilities and what are often seen as psychosocial or soft skills (Farrington et al., 2012).

X: INTEGRATIVE SUMMARY

In thismonograph, we have examined the development of a large number of adolescents from diverse socioeconomic and racial/ethnic backgrounds. Overall, these young Americans showed much stronger evidence of positive than problematic development, even at their most vulnerable times. Absolute levels of their engagement in healthy behaviors, supportive relationships with parents and friends, and positive self-perceptions and psychological well-being were much higher than their angry and depressive feelings, engagement in risky behaviors, and negative relationships with parents and peers. We did not find much evidence that adolescence is a time of heightened risk. Rather, most of these adolescents experienced relatively stable and developmentally healthy trajectories across a wide range of beliefs, behaviors, emotional functioning, and relationships, with slight increases or decreases at different points in development that varied across domains. That said, however, some developmental periods were riskier than others, depending on the outcome assessed as well as the gender and race/ethnicity of the adolescent. An examination of the entirety of adolescence (ages 12–20) allows us to pinpoint when, on average, such changes occurred.

IX: PEER CHARACTERISTICS: PEER CHARACTERISTICS

In this chapter, we summarize our findings for both positive aspects of peer relationships (peer communication, peer support, and positive friends) and negative aspects of peer relationships (negative friends and peer drug norms). These different measures were chosen, in part, to parallel our parent measures. For example, we have parent and peer measures of support and communication as well as assessments of positive and negative aspects of both types of relationships. This allowed us to assess the nature of changes in our adolescents’ relationships with their parents versus their peers. Although there is great deal of interest in the changes in these two social contexts, very few studies have looked at changes over time in both contexts. This is quite odd given the amount of rhetoric linking these two systems and suggesting that adolescence is largely about the conjoint declines in connections with one’s parents and increases in one’s connections with one’s peers. One of our main goals was to help to fill this void. Our results are shown in Tables 17 and 18 and Figure 6.