What Does it Take to Get Youth Involved in Activities What Does it Take to Get Youth Involved in Activities? A Pattern-Centered Approach to Youth, Family, and Community Predictors Nicole Zarrett Tufts University Stephen C. Peck and Jacquelynne S. Eccles University of Michigan

Acknowledgements We thank the following people for their support of this project (listed alphabetically): Elaine Belansky, Todd Bartko, Heather Bouchey, Nick Butler, Celina Chatman, Diane Early, Kari Fraser, Leslie Gutman, Katie Jodl, Ariel Kalil, Linda Kuhn, Sarah Lord, Karen McCarthy, Oksana Malanchuk, Alice Michael, Melanie Overby, Stephen C. Peck, Robert Roeser, Sherri Steele, Erika Taylor, Janice Templeton, Cindy Winston, and Carol Wong. Data reported here come from grants to Jacquelynne S. Eccles and Arnold J. Sameroff from the MacArthur Network on Successful Adolescent Development in High Risk Settings (Chair: R. Jessor), the National Institutes for Child Health and Human Development, and to Jacquelynne S. Eccles from the W.T. Grant Foundation. Special thanks to my two coauthors

Dynamic Systems Person Environment Fit Optimal Functioning Personal Needs Environmental Opportunities f| the dynamic systems model, at its simplest form can be understood as the bidirectional relation or “FUSION” between levels of the individual and its complex ecology. The Person-Environment fit/ Stage Environment Fit model is a nice example of this: For this paper I wanted to not only look at the relation between the levels of a system, In this case Individual to Environment, BUT zero in on each level Looking at the combinations of factors within each level while simultaneously examining relations across these levels of the system

Holistic Interactionism (Magnusson, et al., 2001) Example: Activity Choice Pattern-centered analyses and its theoretical grounding in holistic interactionism: is an effective method to test a dynamic systems model. Emphasizing how multiple factors within each level of a system combine to create meaning. For example: SUSIE AND JANIE. Capturing an within-individual level…

Basic Expectancy Value Model (Eccles, 1993) Sport Expectancies + Music Expectancies _ ACTIVITY CHOICE + Sport Values Often scene like this: The theory behind the Basic E-V model is a good example of such an approach… Choices aren’t made in a vacuum, but rather are made relative to the push and pull of the many choices available to them, _ Music Values

Analyses Activity Participation Patterns Participation Continuity Cluster analysis using Sleipner 2.0 Package for 7th, 9th, and 11th grade activity participation patterns Adolescent Motivational Profile Parent Socialization Patterns (behaviors and beliefs) Community Resource Profiles Participation Continuity Beginning in the 7th/9th and continuing through Grade 11 Comparisons Univariate Analyses with Planned Contrasts Identifying over-representation Cross-tabs (ChiSquare analyses) Identify Youth Activity patterns through cluster analysis using Sleipner at the 7th, 9th and 11th grades Youth’s stability/continuity within these patterns over times were defined as Univariate analyses with planned contrasts were used to make comparisons between youth of different activity profiles controlling for the most obvious 3rd vars. Identified the activity pattern that was linked with the highest beneficial outcomes Then considered which of the neighborhood constellations, parent socialization patterns, and youth motivational profiles that youth in positive activities was over-represented. To identify what is operating to get youth into positive activities

Maryland Adolescent Development in Context Study (MADICS) (PI’s J Maryland Adolescent Development in Context Study (MADICS) (PI’s J. Eccles and A. Sameroff) A community-based longitudinal study 7th, 9th, and 11th grades, 1 and 3 yrs post H.S. 1,482 adolescents and their families 49% female 61% African American, 35% White Pretax family income in 1990: Mean: 42,500-52,500 / Range: 5, 000-75,000 Income normatively distributed among both African Americans and Whites. A few papers (including dissertation) that have stemmed off of this approach. Less income disparity between races than national samples

Measures Youth Activities Constructive Activities Sports, School-related, Community, Volunteer and Religious activities. Reading, Homework, Work, Chores and playing a Musical Instrument. Passive Activities Hanging out with Friends and Watching Television It then had to all be put on the same metric… creating the same scaling for all activities and across all waves : was then used to measure all activity items on a scale of 1 thru 5 Activities were measured on a scale of 1 thru 5 (1=little to no involvement in the activity 5=participate daily)

Measures continued… Youth Motivation Profiles Self-concepts of Ability in and Value of: Academics, Sports, Music/Arts, Social School Engagement, Self-Esteem, Alcohol Use Parent Socialization Patterns Expectancy-Value of Youth in: Academics, Sports, Music/Arts Encouragement/Frustration with the Youth in the Activity Own Activity Involvement Time Spent with Youth Community Profiles Neighborhood Problems Neighborhood Resources Neighborhood Social Support (collective efficacy) School Quality AND Indicators of functioning included: Academic achievement (GPAs), Positive peers, Negative peers, depression Youth reports of how often they had an alcoholic beverage in the past 6 months

Activity Participation Patterns First examined the ways in which youth spend their out-of-school time by taking a very detailed account of how youth spend their time across multiple unstructured and organized activities at the 7th, 8th, and 11th grades. 1. The result: the picture in itself, gives you an idea of the complexity that cluster analyses can capture. 2. Activities measured on the right handside… how the interact with one another in distinct ways to create TYPES. So at each wave I have various sport-dominant activity patterns, other-activities patterns, and a low-engaged pattern

Youth Motivation Profile I also approached predictors of participation at the individual, parent, and community level using this methodological technique

Parent Socialization Patterns

Community Support Profile Once I establish within level patterns I could begin looking across these levels Achieving a true dynamic systems model. That is, Susie my earlier example, who I predicted to play a musical instrucment based on her within individual composition May end up engaging in a different activity altogether because of the types of family and community resources available to her

Developmental Outcomes Low-Engagement = Negative Participation in Activities = Positive Sports Participation = Mixed In previous work. I found: Looks familiar Basic model is Similar to variable-centered

Under the Microscope SPORT-ONLY vs. SPORT+ACTIVITIES 11th Grade Means by Continuous Activity Participation Patterns I find some nuances between the activity patterns that are important for further research and policy the Sport-Only and Sport+Activity youth were affiliated with significantly different peer groups. greater increases in negative peer affiliations across the secondary school years than did stable participation in the Sport+Activity and Other-Activities group. Although continuous participation in a Sport+Activity pattern was associated with the greatest declines in depression across the full age range examined. In line with a holistic perspective, it is also likely that such differences are due to what youth are doing with their remaining free time. Outside of sports participation, Sport-Only youth are spending the majority of their remaining free time hanging out with friends and watching television. In contrast, the Sport+Activity youth are spending substantial time in other constructive activities where they are able to apply and exercise skills they acquire from one activity setting to the other. Different peer groups, but also different social and personal identities leisure culture”

Predictors of Participation Community Family Youth Sport+Activity For current paper, In keeping with the theoretical models discussed, we used a pattern-centered approach to examine what combinations of youth, family, and community factors at Wave 1, in relation with one another, increase youth’s chances of continuously engaging in the Sport+Activities pattern, (the most positive activity pattern of those that emerged), through adolescence. No other study has simultaneously taken into account the interaction of multiple factors within each level of the system (individual, family, community), and how these levels combine to predict adolescents’ time use.

SOCIAL ECOLOGICAL MODEL COMMUNITY FAMILY PARENT SCHOOL CHILD PEERS Applying the Ecological/Dynamic systems frameworks, our findings support the importance of considering youth activity participation choices in terms of the mutual interactions between nested contextual systems:

Nested Contextual Systems Community Family Youth Specifically, youth, nested in a highly supportive community, were more likely to have parents who had a highly supportive activity-oriented socialization pattern (HiSoc, HiSoc-LoRM, HiSoc-HiFrus). In turn, parents’ positive socialization patterns were found to be related to an activity-oriented motivational profile in their adolescent (Sport-HiPos), which, in turn, significantly related to their continuous engagement in the Sport+Activities pattern through adolescence. Can obviously be read the opposite way as well… interactions, not uni-directional Youth Participation

Highlights ONE Youth Profile predictive of participation in the Sport+Activities pattern Across race, gender, and SES Although 3 types of sport-related youth profiles (Hi EV in sports), there was just Identify a pattern that is predictive of participation in the Sport+Activities pattern across race, gender, and SES Explain differences in a meaningful way.

Youth Profile Still can be more elaborate: minority identity, expectations for discrimination, perceived stereotypes

Highlights continued… THREE Parent socialization patterns At the family level there was a variety of different ways that parents can positively socialize their youth to participate in the Sport+Activities pattern.

Parent Socialization Although we predicted that the Sport-HiPos socialization pattern, characterized by …. would be the most supportive family environment, Parents with a HiPos-LoRM or HiPos-HiFrus socialization pattern were just as likely to have children in the Sport+Activities pattern. Therefore, with highly supportive beliefs and parent encouragement, less of parents’ own participation in activities (role-modeling) or general time spent with youth (parent-youth time use) did not appear to undermine their children’s activity participation. Likewise, when high parent frustration with their children’s activity engagement is coupled with highly supportive parents (both through their beliefs and behaviors), parent frustration did not appear to undermine their children’s activity participation. In contrast, youth whose parents reported both experiencing high levels of frustration working with them, and having less supportive beliefs and behaviors (LoSoc-HiFrus) were significantly less likely to have a motivational profile that supported continuous involvement in the Sport+Activities pattern. Therefore, contrary to previous research (reviewed above) indicating that parent frustration is highly related to youth dropping out of activities (Brustad, 1996), our findings suggest the extent which this is true depends on other aspects of the parents’ beliefs and behaviors. GENDER and SES differences: HI SOC = Hi SES and male (not a distribution issue, but rather suggests parent soc operates different for males than females) HiSoc-Frus= Low SES

Highlights continued… TWO Community Profiles ADD RACE, SEX, AND SES

Community at the level of the community, having a highly supportive neighborhood and school, with little neighborhood problems was highly predictive of youth participation in the Sport+Activities pattern. However, just as predictive of positive youth activity participation was a community that had a highly supportive neighborhood and school, but was also ranked as having the greatest severity of neighborhood problems relative to the other community contexts that emerged. Therefore, while a high-risk neighborhood environment is not beneficial for youth development, these findings suggest that with high quality schools, and high amounts of resources and social support/community coherence in the neighborhood, high-risk neighborhoods could be just as supportive an environment for getting youth into developmentally beneficial activities. In turn, in other patterns that emerged, Our findings suggest that an average-quality school system would not be enough to buffer the negative impact of a high risk, low support neighborhood for getting youth into a positive activity pattern (see LoNgh-MedSch). Likewise, an average-support neighborhood was not supportive of youth’s involvement in the Sport+Activities pattern when coupled with a poor school system (see MedNgh-LoSch). In fact, these community patterns were least promotive for getting youth into the Sport+Activities pattern. Clear finding that school and community are intricately tied Some differences by demographics, so that SES…

Distal factors Proximal availability of resources and sense of safety in neighborhoods and schools Proximal Parent Peer Individual Demonstrates how effective a method this is to examine how distal factors such as the availability of resources and sense of safety in individuals’ neighborhoods and schools, along with more proximal parent and youth factors function to encourage or limit youth’s membership in activity patterns.

Conclusions and Future Directions Equifinal and Multifinal development Dropping out of Activities Supports for a Diversity of Youth 1. sets the stage for more detailed analyses of both “equifinal” (e.g. diverse activity participation pattern pathways to the same developmental outcome) and “multifinal” (e.g. the same/similar activity participation pattern pathway leading to very different developmental outcomes) development. 2. Pattern-centered analyses can help examine these changes in participation patterns, identifying how youth who have dropped out of an organized activity are now spending their free time; Is their time spent in other organized activities, or devoted to greater responsibilities in the home or paid employment, or spent in unstructured settings with friends, or watching TV and/or playing video games? 3. Emphasize the need to identify what supports are necessary to meet the needs of a diversity of youth.

Conceptual Model 7th Grade 9th Grade 11th Grade Y F Y F Y F A A A C C These three studies, combined, set up the framework for testing a more accurate theoretical/empirical model of the influence of activities on individuals’ development that takes into account the complex associations among the person, their environment, and conglomeration of activities. It is hypothesized that activities’ influence on development is a function of the synergistic and bidirectional influences of what gets youth into the activity and the impact of the activity pattern that youth engage in. Outcome Outcome Outcome

Thank you. For more information: nicole.zarrett@tufts.edu OR www.rcgd.isr.umich.edu/garp/