New Directions for Youth Development

During adolescence, young people are traversing exciting and also challenging stages in their development. Mindfulness, if taught in a developmentally appropriate way, has the potential to be an asset in adolescents' lives. Developmentally appropriate approaches of mindfulness intervention during adolescence need to consider adolescents' social contexts (for example, school setting, peer group, family), their cognitive and emotional stages in development, and age-specific strength and vulnerabilities. This chapter puts mindfulness education into a developmental perspective, and presents the Learning to BREATHE program as a school-based universal intervention for adolescents...

Adolescence is a developmental period of risk, as well as a window of opportunity for cultivating positive development and thriving. It is characterized by simultaneous changes in the brain, body, mind, and social domains that offer a platform for building new skills and habits. This chapter discusses the role that secular forms of mindfulness and compassion training may play in fostering positive development in adolescence. The emerging discipline of "Developmental Contemplative Science" (DCS) is introduced, the theoretical and empirical basis of mindfulness in adolescence is illustrated in depth, and secular mindfulness and compassion practices for youth are portrayed...

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Commentators interested in school-based prevention programs point to the importance of economic issues for the future of prevention efforts. Many of the processes and aims of prevention science are dependent upon prevention resources. Although economic analysis is an essential tool for assessing resource use, the attention given economic analysis within school-based prevention remains cursory. Largely, economic analyses of school-based prevention efforts are undertaken as secondary research. This limits these efforts to data that have been collected previously as part of epidemiological and outcomes research...

Prevention field has achieved major advances in developing, implementing, and testing the efficacy of preventive interventions in controlled settings. Nevertheless, there is still a gap in translating the success of programs in efficacy trials into real-life settings. Dissemination of evidence-based programs is a major challenge. The authors argue that promoting adoption of evidence-based programs requires further improvements in three areas, and collaboration between researchers and practitioners. First, there is a need to develop a holistic assessment system encompassing both risk/need and readiness assessments...

Rigorous tests of theory-based programs require faithful implementation. Otherwise, lack of results might be attributable to faulty program delivery, faulty theory, or both. However, once the evidence indicates the model works and merits broader dissemination, implementation issues do not fade away. How can developers enhance the likelihood that the program will be delivered as designed and thus get results close to what was possible under controlled conditions? How can they address program weaknesses without undermining conceptual integrity? What role can they play in making the program visible and attractive to institutional adopters? This chapter uses field experience from a theory-based program, Project ALERT, to suggest possible strategies for enhancing program attractiveness to potential adopters and users, facilitating program fidelity while maintaining room for adaptation and taking a program to scale...

IPSY (Information + Psychosocial Competence = Protection) is a universal life skills program aiming at the promotion of generic intra- and interpersonal life skills, substance specific skills (for example, resistance skills), school bonding, knowledge, and the prevention of substance misuse with a focus on alcohol and tobacco in youth. This program is based on the WHO's life skills approach as well as on theories and empirical findings concerning the development of substance misuse during early adolescence...

The EU-Dap study aimed to develop and evaluate a school-based curriculum for the prevention of substance use among young people. The school curriculum, "Unplugged," is based on social influence approach and addresses social and personal skills, knowledge, and normative beliefs. It consists of 12 one-hour interactive sessions delivered by teachers. Its effectiveness was evaluated through a randomized trial involving 7,079 pupils of seven European countries. Unplugged was effective in reducing cigarette smoking, episodes of drunkenness, and the use of cannabis at short term...

Research concerning the etiology and prevention of substance misuse has led to the development of preventive interventions that are theory-based and effective. One such approach, Life Skills Training (LST), targets key etiologic factors using a conceptual framework derived from social learning theory and problem behavior theory. LST has been extensively tested in a series of randomized trials and found effective in preventing the use/misuse of alcohol, tobacco, marijuana, and other psychoactive drugs. Research demonstrates that it is effective when implemented under different delivery conditions, by different program providers, with different age groups, and with different populations...

Anhedonia refers to the inability of experiencing pleasure in positive life events. It has been conceptualized as a stable yet malleable characteristic and is associated with hypoactivity in the mesolimbic and mesocortical dopaminergic systems. Very recently, it has been posited as an etiologic factor associated with drug addiction onset, escalation, and relapse. Prevention programming could be developed to counteract the harmful impact of anhedonia, so as to minimize its impact on drug misuse. Remedial efforts are those that either (1) permit the individual to tolerate low levels of pleasure without resorting to drug misuse or other maladaptive behaviors that may unhealthily besot pleasure (for example, through normalization, structuring time, or meditation) or (2) counteract anhedonia by enhancing ones capability to experience pleasure (for example, behavioral activation, positive psychology, pharmacotherapy, or pursuit of positive addictions)...

Adolescence is characterized by incredible development in the prefrontal cortex of the brain, which is responsible for behavioral and emotional self-regulation, and higher order cognitive decision-making skills (that is, executive function). Typically late prefrontal cortical development and its integration with limbic areas of the brain associated with reward, pleasure, novelty seeking, and emotion can contribute to substance misuse vulnerability during adolescence. In this chapter, literature on the developmental integration of the prefrontal cortex with emotion and motivation centers of the brain is reviewed...

During adolescence, teenagers try a range of risk behaviors including smoking, drinking, and the use of soft drugs. Because substance use contributes to an unhealthy lifestyle of teenagers on the short term and can lead to serious health problems on the longer term, prevention in this target group is important. This chapter provides an overview of the determinants of substance use on the one hand, and primary and secondary prevention opportunities on the other hand, especially in the school context. At the end, future directions and recommendations for school, youth, and family are discussed...

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This chapter focuses on two remote rural communities that engaged young people in meaningful community development efforts to build social capital. One community connected youth to the assets of the community and created opportunities for young adults to strengthen social networks. The other created partnerships and networks to build intergenerational trust. Both communities intentionally engaged young people in these efforts in order to sustain their communities' economic vitality.

For youth who are the most vulnerable to challenging community conditions, more limited opportunities, and poor health, educational and economic trajectories derive especially strong benefits from engagement in community youth development efforts. Although communities can benefit in powerful ways from the knowledge and insight of these youth populations, the experiences of vulnerable youth are often underrepresented in planning and decision making. This article draws on lessons learned from two communities that successfully engaged such youth in a community change initiative over four years...

This article reviews research and offers program examples for developing social capital in youth with a range of vulnerabilities: emotional, physical, social, and developmental. Protective factors provided by developing social capital at the individual level include access to support networks, transition to employment, and community connectedness. The authors feature approaches from the cooperative extension system, which links university and community resources, and identify exemplary programs that support social capital development by intervening with families, schools, neighborhoods, and communities...

Using 4-H and FFA case study findings, this article explores how community service-learning supports the building of social capital between rural youth and adults and the positive effects on community viability. Key elements of practice form a community development approach to service-learning, which opens up doorways for youth to partner with adult leaders and decision makers, gain credibility as resources and problem solvers, address community issues, and raise awareness of the value of school- and community-based youth programs...

This article focuses on how 4-H youth participants are building social capital, or connections among individuals and community members, through their 4-H experiences. These experiences can be seen through the lens of such 4-H delivery modes as the traditional 4-H club, after-school programs, and school enrichment programs. In addition, other experiences such as leadership camps and conferences or activities in the local community afford youth the opportunity to build the relationships, trust, and respect reflective of social capital...

As part of our inquiry into how youth development and 4-H programming can affect the development of social capital for youth and for the community, we engaged youth in ripple mapping. Based on this information, we provide a typology of participation structures in youth development activities and the expected bridging and bonding social capital outcomes for each type. This article outlines the key factors underlying the typology and discusses strategies for using the typology to expand the impact of youth development and 4-H programming on young people and communities...

This article provides a detailed description of how to implement a ripple mapping activity to assess youth program effects on community capital and concludes with examples from Maine and Kansas. The maps lead to group reflection on project outcomes and further research and evaluation questions for group members. The results from five Maine communities showed that youth in schools and community clubs promoted intentional, mutually beneficial relationships with community groups and businesses and increased shared action on community projects...