There is a widespread belief that sport participation inevitably contributes to youth development because sport’s assumed essential goodness and purity is passed on to those who partake in it. Prom...

Youth Sports: What Counts as “Positive Development?”

Research suggests that increasing egalitarian relations between young people and adults is optimal for healthy development; however, the empirical assessment of shared control in youth–adult partnerships is emerging, and the field still requires careful observation, identification, categorization and labeling. Thus, our objective is to offer a conceptual typology that identifies degrees of youth–adult participation while considering the development potential within each type. We use an empowerment framework, rooted in evidence-based findings, to identify five types of youth participation: (1) Vessel, (2) Symbolic, (3) Pluralistic, (4) Independent and (5) Autonomous. The typology is constructed as a heuristic device to provide researchers, practitioners and policy-makers with a common language for articulating degrees of youth participation for optimal child and adolescent health promotion.

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A Typology of Youth Participation and Empowerment for Child and Adolescent Health Promotion

Objectives. To use a systematic review methodology to describe the state of the youth participatory action research (YPAR) literature and synthesize findings about the youth outcomes reported in th...

A Systematic Review of Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) in the United States: Methodologies, Youth Outcomes, and Future Directions:

Late childhood and early adolescence represent a critical transition in the developmental and academic trajectory of youth, a time in which there is an upsurge in academic disengagement and psychopathology. PAR projects that can promote youth’s sense of meaningful engagement in school and a sense of efficacy and mattering can be particularly powerful given the challenges of this developmental stage. In the present study, we draw on data from our own collaborative implementation of PAR projects in secondary schools to consider two central questions: (1) How do features of middle school settings and the developmental characteristics of the youth promote or inhibit the processes, outcomes, and sustainability of the PAR endeavor? and (2) How can the broad principles and concepts of PAR be effectively translated into specific intervention activities in schools, both within and outside of the classroom? In particular, we discuss a participatory research project conducted with 6th and 7th graders at an urban middle school as a means of highlighting the opportunities, constraints, and lessons learned in our efforts to contribute to the high-quality implementation and evaluation of PAR in diverse urban public schools.

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Participatory Action Research (PAR) in Middle School: Opportunities, Constraints, and Key Processes

https://cjnr.archive.mcgill.ca/article/download/1937/1931

Community-Based Participatory Research for Health

SUMMARY This article contributes to the development of a critical social theory of youth empowerment which emphasizes collective efforts to create sociopolitical change. It draws upon analysis of four youth empowerment models, and upon findings from a participatory research study which identified key dimensions of critical youth empowerment: (1) a welcoming, safe environment, (2) meaningful participation and engagement, (3) equitable power-sharing between youth and adults, (4) engagement in critical reflection on interpersonal and sociopolitical processes, (5) participation in sociopolitical processes to affect change, and (6) integrated individual- and community-level empowerment. It concludes with discussion of the measurement of outcomes, and the challenges and opportunities for empowerment in youth organization.

Toward a Critical Social Theory of Youth Empowerment

In this paper, the authors explore representations and interpretations of images of youth that surfaced in discussions with groups of adolescents in four community youth organizations As part of a larger multi‐method study, adolescents created photo‐essays on the theme ‘Youth Making a Difference in the Community’ These projects then served as triggers for small‐group discussions around the product and meaning of the exercise In the analysis of the discussion‐group transcripts, one of the striking findings was how these youth, in the processes of creating and reflecting on their photo‐essays, perceived and challenged dominant societal images; reconstructed alternative images based on their personal and peer experiences; and valued visibility and recognition of youth's contributions to the community as a way of changing the image of youth The authors discuss implications for research and educational practices aimed at youth empowerment and recasting societal images

Louise B. Jennings

Papers

Toward a Critical Social Theory of Youth Empowerment

Societal images of youth: representations and interpretations by youth actively engaged in their communities

Global Cases of Critical Youth Empowerment in Action

Critical Youth Empowerment: Engaging Young People in Transformative Community Actions Around the Globe